The New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) awarded Gaia $1 million to support the first field demonstration of Gaia's new 75kW PowerTower.

The PowerTower will provide turnkey, distributed energy storage scaled to meet the needs of utilities and industrial customers, and builds on Gaia's expertise in the field of turnkey energy storage systems. The 75kW PowerTower will be capable of functioning independently, or aggregating in larger blocks to meet demand needs of up to 1MW, and is portable to respond to changing power requirements.

The field demonstration will consist of a 300kW/900kWh system, incorporating four 75kW PowerTowers, installed on Delaware County Electric Cooperative’s (DCEC) distribution network. The system will simultaneously provide dispatchable demand reduction to DCEC and backup power to an industrial customer on DCEC’s distribution network.

Besides providing additional stability to the DCEC network and to its customers, the project will allow DCEC to defer upgrading a substation on the affected distribution feeder. The installation is expected to be completed in 2007.

On a strategic level, Gaia’s partnerships with utilities help develop innovative strategies for addressing current market challenges. As power companies adapt to an evolving energy landscape, shaped by issues such as deregulation and the growing feasibility of renewable energy sources, Gaia offers the know-how necessary to develop and deploy an energy storage strategy that solves real business problems, now and in the future.

DCEC is a rural electric cooperative serving 5,000 members in the greater Catskill Mountain region of New York. DCEC maintains approximately 800 miles of distribution lines and serves a geographic area extending into five counties.