Aimed at reducing dependence on nuclear power in the wake of the Great East Japan Earthquake of 2011, which has seen most of the country’s fleet shuttered ever since, the FiT was hugely successful in stimulating solar deployment.
However, this has led to widespread curtailment of daytime solar generation. Battery energy storage system (BESS) assets, such as Iizuka Seta Energy Storage, are being promoted to establish so-called “output control” while also offering other services to help stabilise the grid.
Targeted for completion in the 2027 fiscal year (FY2027), the project is receiving Capex support through the government Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) FY2024 Subsidy for the Expansion of Renewable Energy Introduction and Support for the Introduction of Power Storage Systems Such as Grid-Mounted Batteries.
The scheme offers up to around a third of Capex cost to developers (ESN Premium). It is one of three prominent support mechanisms for megawatt-scale BESS development in Japan, alongside a Tokyo Metropolitan Government subsidy that covers up to 50% Capex cost and the Long Term Decarbonisation Power Source Auction (LTDA) capacity market solicitations.
Japan is also seeing a significant number of merchant BESS projects that stack revenues from participation in balancing markets and the JPEX power exchange. Developers of these projects often forego the subsidy schemes, which come with stringent conditions that limit merchant revenue upside. However, those projects are typically smaller-scale utility BESS projects, almost all sized at a ‘sweet spot’ of 2MW/8MWh.
Akaysha’s project partners
Akaysha Energy, backed by investor Blackrock and perhaps best known for its Waratah Super Battery project in New South Wales (NSW), recently completed another project of similar scale in the Australian state. The 415MW/1,660MWh Orana BESS was announced as completed in late June, sited in the Central-West Orana renewable energy zone (REZ).
Alongside its projects in Australia and Japan, Akaysha is also active in the US and Germany.
Meanwhile, its partners in Fukuoka are also working on several other BESS projects in Japan.
Ibeet is a joint venture (JV) between major trading conglomerate (‘Sogo Sosha’) Itochu Corporation and leasing and financial services group Tokyo Century, both of which will likely be familiar names to Energy-Storage.news readers for projects in Japan and internationally.
Itochu partnered with UK-based energy storage and digital energy aggregator-optimiser Moixa in 2018 and licensed the startup’s Gridshare aggregation software (Moixa itself was later acquired by a US virtual power plant company affiliated with Sunrun, Lunar Energy).
Leveraging the software platform, Ibeet was set up in 2021 to offer digital energy services and equipment leasing to residential, commercial and industrial (C&I) and utility-scale market segments. Ibeet leases solar PV systems and BESS and also sells solar-generated power.
Ibeet is also an investor in real estate company Tokyu Land’s Libra LLC consortium, which is developing a 174MW BESS project pipeline across Japan.
Tokyu Land entered the grid-scale BESS market in 2023 and is developing around 340MW of projects in Japan, including the JPY30 billion (US$184.7 million) Libra LLC portfolio.
Japanese battery storage system integrator PowerX revealed earlier this year that it had received a 230MWh equipment supply order from Itochu Corporation, Tokyo Century and Mitsubishi Estate for a project in Chikuzen, Fukuoka, around 30km from Iizuka City.
PowerX will also supply and integrate the BESS at Iizuka, together with Itochu’s in-house BESS brand, Blue Storage. Akaysha said the developer will provide “technical and commissioning expertise.”