Onslow Distributed Energy Resource (DER) Project

Stage One
Stage One was completed in July 2018, servicing the immediate electricity needs of the Onslow community. It included the construction of: 

• A gas-fired modular power station that is designed to be able to efficiently contract in size as the renewable energy contribution increases, or expand to meet future growth requirements
• A new transmission line, zone substation and distribution network extension.

Stage Two
Stage Two included additional centralised infrastructure construction combined with distributed solar PV and batteries:

• A solar farm adjacent the new power station 
• A battery energy storage system at the zone substation
• Distributed solar PV systems across the system
• Distributed batteries across the system.​

Solar Farm and Battery Energy Storage system (BESS)
The 1 MW Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) located at the zone substation was energised onto the Onslow network in May 2019. The Solar Farm located adjacent to the power station was energised in June 2019.

Onslow Renewable Energy Pilot
The Pilot involved Horizon Power selling generously incentivised solar PV panels and batteries to residential and small business customers in Onslow, to achieve the fast take-up of solar and battery needed to test the management of renewable energy in an isolated regional community. We partnered with Western Australian company, Mechanical Project Services to deliver and install up to 2 MW solar PV and up to 1 MW hour of small scale battery storage.  

This high and rapid uptake of renewables by the Onslow community was essential in enabling Horizon Power to effectively pilot an intelligent control system known as a Distributed Energy Resource Management System (DERMS).  This system will allow us to manage the assets connected to our networks in a coordinated way.  

Distributed Energy Resource Management System (DERMS)
Horizon Power executed a contract with US supplier PXiSE Energy Solutions, LLC to provide the software for a Distributed Energy Resources Management System (DERMS) for a platform to support Horizon Power's strategy and vision to support greater renewable and distributed energy resources in regional Western Australia in the future. 

The DERMS will help address safety, reliability and operational challenges, resulting from increased DER on Horizon Power's network. The solution will provide Horizon Power the platform for increased renewable energy capacity whilst maintaining network stability and integrity. It will be utilised to manage distributed energy resources including solar, wind, energy storage, combined heat and power, smart appliances, conventional generation as a coordinated system. 

What's next?

Onslow’s world first with 100% hydrocarbon free
In a world first, Horizon Power demonstrated that it's possible to run an energy network on 100 per cent, hydrocarbon free energy without any traditional backup generation. In a successful trial in May this year, the Onslow microgrid was run entirely on clean, green solar and battery power for 80 minutes.

Through the trial, the town’s electricity needs were serviced by around 600 kilowatts of utility solar and 700 kilowatts of customer generated solar supported by battery technology (Distributed Energy Resources). This is a very exciting step towards enabling Horizon Power to understand the impacts of renewables on our networks, and has been quoted as being a ‘ground-breaking’ trial to blueprint energy systems around Australia.\

Further testing continues, as we prepare to power the town with solely renewable energy on several occasions between the 22nd and 30th of September 2021.