In this article, PTR's CPO, Saqib Saeed, and Research Analyst, Siddiqa Batool, explain how the Middle East is accelerating its transition toward renewable energy—particularly solar power—supported by a growing focus on energy storage.
The potential for energy storage in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) is significant, given the country's abundant resources and growing demand for energy. With a rapidly expanding population and economy, KSA is facing increasing energy demand.
“Saudi Arabia aims to generate 50% of power from renewables by 2030,” . Available: https://www. arabnews.com/node/1795406/saudi-arabia. “UAE Renewable Energy Strategy,” .
In GCC countries, to boost the development of residential solar, the customers are ofered remuneration for the amount of electricity that is fed back into the grid at a specific time. Hence, this kind of scheme and incentives might need to be revised to cater to the development and growth of the residential energy storage market.
Storage as a solution: Energy storage has emerged as one of the potential solutions to address the challenge of balancing supply and demand that arises from the intermittent nature of renewable energy sources. Increases the reliability and stability of the power grid by smoothing out fluctuations in supply and demand.
The UAE has installed most of the energy storage systems in the GCC region. In 2016, Abu Dhabi Water & Electricity Authority announced the deployment of around 108 MW of sodium-sulfur-based BESS with an individual capacity of around 4 MW and 8 MW at diferent locations to support their distribution network.
Is battery energy storage a new technology?
The battery energy storage market has not experienced any significant growth in this region hence it is still seen as a new technology and the costs are relatively high compared to the parts of the world.