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• Large battery installations by San Miguel Corporation

• Tesla electric cars

• Series / parallel hybrids

• Charging stations

The Philippines likes big battery installations . . .

Did any news come out to say that batteries would CONSERVE drinking water and irrigation water. But how? 

• • • Hydro-electric power plants can start quickly, raise power level, lower it and shut down quickly.

    • Since they can act quickly, they are called upon to balance the load level in the system.

    • For example, water from the Angat dam is collected after driving the turbines and supplied as drinking water, and/or irrigation water.

    • Because of the versatility of hydro-electric power plants at the dams in Ambuklao, Binga, Pantabangan, Angat, Caliraya, Kalayaan, and some others, they are dispatched by the Load Dispatching Center to perform "regulation" on the needed instants, by how much power, and within certain times. This is done with approval from the government.

    • The water used is gone from the dams for good, except water as used by Kalayaan Pumped Storage Power Plant.

    • The dams will wait for the weather to bring water during the rainy season., 

Do batteries now help conserve water at the dams to provide abundant supply of drinking water and irrigation water?

Batteries are the future sources of stored power. 

• The Philippines inaugurated a Large battery installation program.

• Tesla electric cars are run by batteries, and Tesla built battery sets for homes to store energy during hours of low cost on the grid, or from their own solar panels on the roof.

• The Project being discussed here is for small locations.

• For locations / countries that do not have the required charging stations, the most recommended option is the "hybrid-electric" vehicle.

• The internal combustion engine will supply the charging current to the batteries, for it to operate at its highest efficiency. This is the case of "series" hybrids. In parallel hybrids, the engine drives the shaft, and the batteries are made to charge so that the load on the engine is kept high. The electric motor takes over completely if the engine efficiency cannot be maintained high. Furthermore, if the engine is already loaded high and more power is needed on the shaft, the motor will do "bayanihan" to help the engine with its own power, to also drive the shaft.

• Of course, advanced technologies are promoting electric vehicles, while veering away from hybrid-electric vehicles. This is understandable because they have sufficient charging stations scattered in convenient locations for the EV to use.

• In the Philippines, for instance, it is not advisable to drive EVs only from Manila to Bicol, or from Manila to the north. It will take time and money before the charging stations could be erected along the way. 

• There is also the fact that transmission lines get in touch with trees and their circuit breakers trip, or typhoons toppling down transmission towers. Power to these charging stations may not exist 24 hours a day during certain instances. Transmission lines like in Luzon, cannot guarantee a match to reliability at a level that the Meralco distribution grid, for example, can accomplish. Meralco's grid takes out a faulted part of the grid and supplies electricity to its customers along another way on its grid,

• In that case, a hybrid-electric vehicle is the king of the job, It cannot be held helpless in the absence of power at the charging stations. 

• In Tagalog, "mayroon siyang dalang baon." (It brought with it things that he will need, such as a meal, etc.)

What are batteries for the Philippines for? Does it make sense?

The answer to these questions may be done by relating them to the Kalayaan Pumped Storage Power Plant (KPSPP).

Somewhere here (Technical Schematics Page), the efficiency of a power plant burning fuel is dictated by load level as a non-negotiable fact. The higher the load level, the more efficient is the usage of fuel to drive the shaft. On the other hand, if the load level is low, the efficiency is low. 

What are the principles of the KPSPP? It becomes a load to the system to raise the efficiency of the system. How does it do this?

At that location in Laguna, there are two lakes. Caliraya Lake is 984 feet above sea level. Laguna de Bay is 6.6 feet above sea level. The difference in the elevation of these two lakes is 977 feet. 

Engineers will say that if you pump water from Laguna the Bay to Caliraya Lake, you are giving that water potential energy. If you allow that water to come down, the potential energy could be given to a turbine to do work and generate electricity. 

In the case of KPSPP, water is pumped to Caliraya Lake using power from the Luzon Grid so that power plants operate at high load levels. And what else? At high loads, they run at higher efficiencies, depending upon the load level.

That water pumped to Caliraya Lake will be allowed to drive the pump that brought it there to run as a generator in reverse. This is done when the grid needs power to meet the load.

What did the system do then? 

• • • KPSPP was run as a pump to store water to a higher lake, when the system load is low to prevent fuel-burning power plants from operating at a lower efficiency.

    • When the load is high to go beyond the capacity of these fuel-burning power plants, that pump is run in reverse, as a generator, to use the water that was stored at a higher elevation. This will prevent the system from cutting off power from load sectors, a factor that affects quality of life and business.

    • During power crises in the early '80s, the Business Committee through its Chairman, Mr Raul Concepcion, suggested to the National Power Corporation to treat KPSPP as a "bank depository" of water. Manufacturers and businesses would schedule their maintenance shut-down to coincide with enough power to pump water to Caliraya. As agreed with NAPOCOR President Gabriel Y Itchon and Minister Geronimo Z Velasco, NAPOCOR would monitor the amount of water stored ("deposited"). When the power supply becomes very low, NAPOCOR will exempt these industries from power interruptions. It will "withdraw" power from lake Caliraya for KPSPP to supply power to them, to prevent "losses" from power interruptions, as shutdown and restart of manufacturing operations cause unretrievable losses. Amado C Vicencio, Jr served at the pilot seat of KPSPP. 

    • President Ferdinand E Marcos has been very pleased with the role of his KPSPP Project in the Electric Power System that has been his appointed support for the country's progress. 

    • In context, KPSPP is one of the many of his projects. There were Geothermal Power Plants in Bacon-Manito, Tiwi, Tongonan, Philippine Nuclear Power Plant #1, Hydo-electric Power Plants for the Agus River in Mindanao, for Pulangi in Bukidnon, his "missionary electricity" projects, the Philippine Associated Smelting and Refining (PASAR) in Leyte, coal plant in Naga, Cebu to become a consumer of the Semirara coal mine in Antique, and many many more projects for his country.

What about other hydro-electric power plants?

Water collected at the "dams" are from nature and it is priceless

• for drinking water, 

• for irrigation, 

• and in very delicate cases, for load regulation or load follow

When one liter is used, that one liter cannot be put back up at the dam. Nature will put one liter there at the time it decides, and not within the control of any human being. 

Water is free, but the cost of electricity and the life of people and their food will be affected. Do not throw away drinking water or water for irrigation, simply to meet the load requirements.

In contrast, if one liter of oil is used to run a power plant, one liter could be replaced from a fuel supplier, at the cost of purchase, and while the supply lasts. 

Have we digressed, talking about power plants? 

No! 

At this point, think about the battery storage plants. They perform in almost the same way as KPSPP. The "load dispatching system" will determine, how much energy is stored, and how much energy is to be reused to meet the requirements to meet the load demand.

Did anybody hear the word that Ireland cut the top of a hill to build an artificial lake so as to have a Pumped Storage Hydro-Electric Power Plant? This activity functions in almost the same way as the KPSPP. One nice thing is the the Philippines was gifted with these two lakes to reduce the losses of the system. This gives better values for the "least-cost" of electricity supplied by the grid. 

Just one added information, spend 100 kilowatt-hours of energy to pump water up to Caliraya Lake. When that water is used to run KPSPP as a generator, it gives 85 kilowatt-hours to the grid. This means that about 15% of the energy stored is lost along the way in friction and efficiencies. 

Would the batteries also lose 15%? Maybe, right about 15%, or maybe less. Performance data might be around somewhere.

One more thing . . .

Much of what is done in power generation, dispatching, planning, etc., are in the field of Economics. Gut feelings related to the future are also considered as inputs. 

Nothing is correct now unless proven so by the future! 

Decisions are made now, so that the future could make it correct!

More of these are being worked on . . . 

Tesla Electric Cars

Series / Parallel Hybrid-Electric Vehicles

Charging Stations