CONNECT WITH US
Climate & Energy

Climate & Energy

Major solar-storage project provides round-the-clock power in DRC Congo

pv magazine Global logo

Published on

Add as a preferred source on Google
Major solar-storage project provides round-the-clock power in DRC Congo

Africa’s largest copper mine is now running on solar baseload power thanks to a large-scale solar-plus-storage power plant.

The Kamoa-Kakula Copper Complex, located in the Central African Copperbelt near Kolwezi in the Democratic Republic of Congo, has been powered by a 233 MW solar plant coupled with a 123 MVA/526 MWh battery energy storage system since the facility entered commercial operation on August 12. The system provides the copper complex with a continuous 30 MW power supply, with output currently peaking at 55 MW.

The facility is owned and operated by project developers CrossBoundary Energy, with Germany’s Dhybrid Power Systems GmbH responsible for engineering the battery system and providing the facility’s control platform.

Figures provided by Dhybrid state that during its first month of operation, the facility displaced around 4 million liters of diesel, worth roughly $11 million.

The project combines over 357,000 solar modules from Aiko, Sungrow solar inverters and medium-voltage stations, battery containers from Risen SYL and EPC Power power conversion systems.

Dhybrid says its universal power platform (UPP) acts as the central control layer for the entire plant, coordinating the solar and battery inverters, power quality meters, protection relays, meteorological sensors, UPS and HVAC units and managed network switches, equating to over 1,300 devices in total.

A statement from the company explains the UPP’s forecasting algorithm tells the operator twenty-four hours ahead what the plant can deliver. “The operator sets the value, and the platform decides every second how to split up to 180 MW of solar between the mine and the batteries, how far to charge for the night, and how to hold the setpoint through cloud cover and load swings,” the statement explains.


Source link
Related Topics:Climate & Energy

Disclaimer

We strive to uphold the highest ethical standards in all of our reporting and coverage. We TheMorningPulse.fyi want to be transparent with our readers about any potential conflicts of interest that may arise in our work. It's possible that some of the investors we feature may have connections to other businesses, including competitors or companies we write about. However, we want to assure our readers that this will not have any impact on the integrity or impartiality of our reporting. We are committed to delivering accurate, unbiased news and information to our audience, and we will continue to uphold our ethics and principles in all of our work. Thank you for your trust and support.