Electric car rally next up for Vattenfall's battery storage facility in Åre

Adjacent to Åre's grand hotel at Åresjön Lake, there are two containers. The orange one houses a European TV channel where a motor driven generator, providing the channel with the extra electricity needed to broadcast, is constantly running. Just next to it is Vattenfall's mobile intelligent energy storage facility with eight connected electric car batteries providing a total of 340 kilowatt hours.  The organisers' electric cars and the electric snowmobiles that shuttle visitors to and from the event will be charged quietly and without carbon dioxide emissions.

These are two examples of how to resolve the challenge of providing a large event with electricity. When the local grid is not enough, it is common to use diesel generators to pick up the extra load or to run temporary cable, possibly resulting in an overloaded grid. A mobile energy storage facility that can be moved around to where it's needed may just be the solution. The technology will be tested for the first time in Sweden at the FIS Alpine World Ski Championships in Åre.

Smart flexible solutions

"We have a project called 'From snowland to island'. Output requirements change with the seasons. Ski resorts such as Åre are in great need of electricity for a few weeks during the winter. It wouldn't be climate-smart to revamp the electricity infrastructure for the needs of a few weeks. So flexible solutions that can be moved around as needed are truly smart. For the summer months, the energy storage facility can be moved to places like the archipelago, cancelling the need to rebuild there too," says Erik Berntsen, Business Developer of Network Solution, a sister company to Vattenfall Eldistribution.

Electric car rally in Jokkmokk

Following the Åre Alpine World Championship, the mobile energy storage facility will move to Jokkmokk in northern Sweden to charge cars for the electric car rally. The testing grounds in Arjeplog have also expressed interest for the 12 weeks a year that they test electric cars.

"Things are changing and we are only at the beginning. The first thing to come is electrification of transportation, and it will progress rapidly. We strive to be prepared and have now ordered more mobile energy storage facilities in varying sizes. There is definitely a future for this solution," concludes Berntsen, developer of the mobile energy storage facility.