Emergency power with battery storage, photovoltaics and combined heat and power plants

Alpiq and Pflugshaupt Engineering AG have developed a concept for the emergency power supply of the Gossau sewage and purification plant on behalf of Energie Gossau AG (ZH). A sustainable battery storage unit, which offers extensive energy management, is being used in place of the old diesel generators. To this end, the emergency power distribution system has been completely reengineered. It now not only supplies the ARA Gossau plants; the design also allows third parties to be supplied with emergency power and opens Energie Gossau AG up to entirely new service concepts as an operator.

The almost 10 tonne battery storage unit with a capacity of 300 kW has been seamlessly integrated into the existing building. The storage unit enables data to be exchanged with the ARA control system, the combined heat and power plant (CHP), the gas tank, the photovoltaic system and various circuit breakers and measuring devices. Messages about the status, faults and the current output are automatically sent to the storage unit and the plants are thus integrated into the emergency power supply. Conversely, the storage unit sends signals about its status and can control the connected plants in stages.

“What is special about the project is that we have not only been able to supply emergency power to our customer, i.e. the sewage treatment plant, but have also been able to include the existing production facilities, the combined heat and power plant and the photovoltaic systems. This is something new for our industry,” says Martin Pflugshaupt, Managing Director of Energie Gossau AG, who is primarily responsible for the concept and project management.