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As California Pins Much of Its Decarbonization Hopes on Energy Storage, SDG&E Opens a New Battery Facility

/in , , /by /The San Diego Union-Tribuneby Rob Nikolewski

They don’t look like much — 126 cubes, each holding 16 modules of batteries — simply sitting on an expanse of flat land owned by San Diego Gas & Electric off Route 163.

But it’s no exaggeration to say that California’s hopes of decarbonizing its power system depend on developing a vast number of utility-scale energy storage facilities across the state, such as the one SDG&E opened earlier this month in Kearny Mesa.

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Tesla to Help Power Santa Barbara’s Cater Water Treatment Plant

/in , , /by /Santa Barbara Independentby Nick Welsh

At a time when every other car on the South Coast seems to be a Tesla, it’s fitting that the City of Santa Barbara will soon be relying on a small mountain of Tesla storage batteries to help move water in and out of its Cater Water Treatment Plant high atop San Roque Road to customers as far away as Montecito. With precious little fanfare, Santa Barbara’s City Council authorized a chain of events that will eventually result in the installation of 16 Tesla battery packs — valued at $3 million — at the facility.

All those battery packs combined will create a stylishly designed assembly of white metal boxes bearing Tesla’s distinctive corporate monogram that together will be about 60 feet wide, seven feet high, and five feet deep. On a good day, these batteries will be capable of cranking out 700 kilowatts of electricity, which is roughly 70 percent of the total load needed to move the 37 million gallons of treated H2O that go in and out of Cater each day.

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Behind the Scenes Maneuvering Averts Even More California Power Outages

/in , , /by /NBC 4 Los Angelesby Patrick Healy

The return of critical electrical shortages last weekend, prompting emergency rolling power cut-offs scattered throughout California, triggered a broad range of extraordinary responses in the ensuing days to bring the statewide grid back from the brink of being overloaded and overwhelmed, officials have revealed.

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