California transportation terminal retrofits energy storage to its solar carports – pv magazine USA

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California transportation terminal retrofits energy storage to its solar carports – pv magazine USA

Energy Toolbase and Stellar Solar implemented an advanced energy management system for the Mira Loma transportation campus.

September 25, 2024 Ryan Kennedy

Energy Toolbase and San Diego based solar installer Stellar Solar Commercial have partnered to deliver a solar and energy storage project for a 24-acre transportation campus operated by Marten Transport in Mira Loma, California.

The project included two solar carport structures adding 197 kW of capacity. Stellar Solar also installed one BYD Chess 60 kW / 266 kWh energy storage system.

The four-hour duration battery is managed by Acumen EMS controls software. The primary control application for the energy storage system is time-of-use (TOU) demand charge management. The system is designed to optimize peak-shaving during all peak TOU periods by discharging the battery when the site’s metered demand rises above thresholds calculated by Acumen EMS for each TOU period. This keeps the site’s metered demand under control, supporting the customer capturing value from their energy assets.

Stellar Solar designed the project using Energy Toolbase’s project modeling platform, ETB Developer, to model the project’s potential savings by adding a storage system.

Marten Transport installed solar in 2019, covering a portion of its electricity needs, but the system did not have a mechanism to deal with utility peak demand charges.

Two carport structures were installed at the site, with the solar system boasting a total installed capacity of 197kW.

“By adding the BYD batteries, Marten now has a comprehensive solution to address both their baseline electricity consumption as well as the demand spikes,” said Brian Grems, founding partner, Stellar Solar.

The system’s real-time performance and savings are visible to Stellar Solar and stakeholders through ETB Monitor. This tool provides insights into the energy storage systems operations and enables continuous assessment and optimization.

“This project demonstrates our commitment to providing innovative energy solutions that drive significant cost savings and operational efficiency in California,” said Kevin Mulley, vice president of operations, Energy Toolbase.

Energy Toolbase is a software platform that provides a suite of project estimating, storage control, and asset monitoring products that enable solar and storage developers to deploy projects more efficiently. Energy Toolbase’s software-as-a-service products are used by over 1,000 distributed energy organizations worldwide.

Stellar Solar was founded in 1998 and has a track record of over 16,000 residential and commercial installations, largely in California. Notable commercial installations include Cedars Sinai Hospital, The Salk Institute, U.S. Foods and the United States Navy.

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