The Challenges

Commercial and Industrial (C&I) electricity customers worldwide are facing pressure to reduce their energy costs. In an increasingly competitive business environment, minimizing and optimizing energy consumption is paramount to being successful.
A key strategy for achieving energy cost reductions requires careful attention to the electricity billing structure. Whether it be through peak power pricing, demand charges, or other mechanisms, utilities provide incentives to their customers to shift their energy consumption in order to reduce overall system costs for the utility.
A battery energy storage system (BESS) is perfectly suited to give customers more control over their energy consumption. By reducing some or all of their peak power consumption or shifting their peak to a more economic time period, C&I customers have the potential to drastically reduce their electricity bill. Demand charge reduction/peak shaving C&I projects are very cost-effective solutions in many utility territories throughout North America.
In addition to improving the bottom line, this financial benefit allows customers to take advantage of the many other useful features available from battery energy storage, such as back-up power.

The Solution

A unique challenge faced by electricity customers in Ontario, Canada is the Global Adjustment Charge (GAC). This annual demand charge is based on a customer’s percentage contribution to the top five hours of grid-wide load demand in Ontario over a 12-month base period. These charges can be very high, but customers can reduce their GAC costs based on their ability to anticipate the top five peak hours and reduce or even eliminate their consumption accordingly.
Leclanché has significant experience in providing energy storage solutions to C&I customers in the Ontario market seeking to reduce their GAC costs. Leclanché recently commissioned the Oakville C&I Project, a 2.0 MW / 4.9 MWh BESS project under a turnkey EPC contract at their facility in Toronto. This solution is expected to reduce the industrial customer’s total GAC costs by over $1 million per year.