Austin SHINES Award Number: DE-EE0007117 CX(s) Applied: A9, B1.31, B5.15 Solar Energy Technologies Office Date: 3/16/2017 Location(s): TX Office(s): Golden Field Office
Office of NEPA Policy and Compliance
March 29, 2017
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Austin SHINES
Award Number: DE-EE0007177
CX(s) Applied: A9, B1.31, B5.15
Solar Energy Technologies Office
Date: 3/16/2017
Location(s): TX
Office(s): Golden Field Office
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is proposing to provide federal funding to Austin Energy to install distributed battery storage systems, smart solar inverters, a distributed energy resource (DER) control platform, and other enabling technologies utilizing customer and utility locations and multiple aggregation models. Austin SHINES is a proposed project that involves the retrofit, replacement and/or modification of existing energy facilities and power generation infrastructure using the listed technologies. The proposed project is comprised of three Budget Periods (BP). A previous NEPA determination (GFO-0007177-001; CX A9, B3.6; 12/23/15) reviewed BP1 activities but restricted BP 2 and 3 pending further review of sites identified for deployment. This NEPA determination is to review all tasks/subtasks of BP 2 and BP 3.
BP 2 would involve the deployment of energy storage systems (ESS) and enabling communication/control equipment at various utility, residential and commercial sites in Austin, TX. Activities associated with BP 2 of the proposed project would include the installation and testing of battery storage and smart inverters and hardware/software devices for integrating the systems. BP 3 would involve a 12 month demonstration of the technologies deployed in BP 2. BP 3 activities would consist of equipment operation, performance monitoring, data collection, analysis and reporting. Desktop research, data analysis, and project management would occur at the headquarters for City of Austin Energy in Austin TX. Software development and equipment testing would take place at Doosan GridTech in Seattle, WA and Pecan Street Inc. in Austin, TX. The facilities in which indoor testing would occur are purpose-built for the type of activities being proposed; there would be no change in the use, mission or operation of existing facilities.