DTE Energy is set to announce Monday a massive, new power storage facility that it is building to help address one of the challenges of the grid and renewable-energy generation: balancing energy supply and demand.
The utility is keeping details of its new center mostly under wraps until a 10:30 a.m. groundbreaking event, but the new development is a significant part of the company’s strategy to meet regulatory carbon emissions standards and fight human-caused climate change. Battery Energy Storage System Advantages And Disadvantages
"Climate change is the defining public policy issue of our time," DTE Chairman and CEO Jerry Norcia wrote in the company’s introduction to its 2022 electric plan, referring to what scientists have concluded are long-term shifts in temperatures and weather patterns. He added that DTE is committing to drastically reducing carbon emissions by retiring coal plants and investing in "clean, Michigan-made renewable energy."
More energy storage can provide opportunity for the state’s largest utility to fulfill that promise.
Norcia, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, U.S. Rep. Debbie Dingell and other dignitaries are scheduled to speak at the media event, which will be held at the former Trenton Channel power plant, renamed the Trenton Channel Energy Center.
The former coal-fired facility in Trenton — which was built in 1924, idled in 2022 and colloquially known as the "Trenton Stacks" — is being transformed into a utility-scale battery energy storage facility, where enough electricity can be stored to power 40,000 homes, a city about the size of Dearborn.
One difference at the site: No more candy cane striped smokestacks, which were recently demolished.
The governor and other speakers are expected to talk about the utility’s efforts and investments and what they are doing to pass and enforce environmental protections while also protecting jobs and the state's economic interests.
Utility storage would give DTE more flexibility to store power from renewable sources — such as wind and solar — and to put electricity back onto the grid when demand and prices are high, potentially solving one of the problems with alternative-power generation: It doesn’t operate on demand.
Cleaner, giant wind turbines only work when the wind is blowing; and similarly, solar panels only work when the sun is shining; but storing power, can help the utility overcome those limitations giving it the ability to provide cleaner, cheaper energy when customers need it.
Under DTE’s resource plan, the company has noted it has gone from generating 77% of its power with coal in 2005 to just 45% in 2023. By 2027, it aims to cut that further to 32%, by 2029 to 15% — and eventually eliminate coal entirely.
DTE seeks to boost its renewable sources, from 14% in 2023 to more than half in 2036.
Commercial And Industrial Energy Storage Contact Frank Witsil: 313-222-5022 or fwitsil@freepress.com.