The Faculty of Supply Engineering at Ostfalia University of Applied Sciences has installed a renewable energy park at its Wolfenbüttel campus. A redox flow battery weighing 5,000 kg has now been added to this energy park. With this system, which is only the second of its kind in Germany, a further storage technology is now available in this "Smart Grid Test Facility".

Redox flow batteries can store large quantities of electrical energy in a liquid electrolyte that is enriched with vanadium ions in various oxidation states. A heavy-duty crane was used to place the heavy redox flow battery container, which was constructed in China by the Canadian company Prudent Energy, on a prepared platform on the campus. The facility already included a wind turbine and an electrolyser for hydrogen generation along with the accompanying gas storage equipment. Wind or photovoltaic electricity generated during the day can be chemically stored in the form of hydrogen using this equipment. This hydrogen is then converted back into electricity at night or during periods of weak wind in order to provide the grid with a stable supply. It is planned that this type of decentralised grid arrangement, termed a “smart grid”, will actively balance out major load fluctuations in the future. The growing contribution of renewable energy sources to the electricity supply grid will lead to increased fluctuations in the power supply.

This energy park is part of the “DESG: Decentralised Storage for Buildings” research project, which has been in progress since August 2011. The cooperation partners are the German companies WAGO (Minden), SMA (Kassel) and Heliocentris (Berlin), along with the Fraunhofer Institute for Chemical Technology ICT (Pfinztal) and the De Montfort University in Leicester, Great Britain. The aim of this research project is to obtain new application-oriented knowledge regarding the interaction and management of various storage technologies in a smart grid. It can be assumed that these technologies will become a standard component of electricity supply grids in the coming years.