Company: Crondall Energy
Client: UK Government
Region: North Sea
Project: Compressed Air Storage
Sector: Energy Transition

Crondall Energy and Durham University have worked in partnership to accelerate the development of Compressed Air Energy Storage (CAES) in the UK continental shelf.

This comes after the award of funding under a £6.7 million UK government Longer Duration Energy Storage competition to investigate feasibility of an offshore CAES system.

The Problem
Longer duration storage is going to be crucial for delivering stability to future net-zero compatible energy supply. At present, there are only a limited number of potential solutions which can deliver upon this and there is a clear requirement for innovative solutions. 

What We Did
Developed a project with the initial aims to explore the technical and economic feasibility of combining a compressed air energy storage (CAES) system with offshore infrastructure to deliver long-term energy storage capacity for the electric grid.

The team explored the likely costs of using electricity to compress air and to store offshore in the UK Continental Shelf. They also considered that, when required, the system is reversed, and the compressed air powers a turbine to produce flexible electrical energy.

Upon completion of the feasibility study, it is hoped that the UK Government will progress the project to develop a full prototype of the technology. 

Value
Crondall Energy accelerated the inclusion of energy transition technology as a key part of strategy. It was anticipated that there would be an opportunity to apply specialist expertise to the transition of offshore technologies to greener renewable solutions. Being proactive in the transition has allowed the Crondall team to be involved in several innovative projects involving carbon dioxide transport, hydrogen integration, electrification of offshore platforms and buoyant production technology. Longer duration energy storage will be another exciting technology to integrate into the increasing renewable capabilities of the organisation. 

KeyFacts Energy Industry Directory: Crondall Energy