The Department of Energy announced a $1.76 billion loan guarantee Wednesday for a massive advanced storage system for California’s grid, adding to an ongoing push by the Biden administration to get clean energy funding out the door before President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration.
The conditional loan for the Willow Rock Energy Storage Center, a compressed air energy storage system in Rosamond, California, aims to address a chief challenge facing electricity: how to support intermittent renewables without raising emissions through use of backup natural gas. As long duration storage, the center from GEM A-CAES roughly 81 miles north of Los Angeles could dispatch energy for up to eight hours, longer than what is available with traditional lithium-ion batteries.
“We’re thrilled to reach this conditional commitment with DOE, which is a huge vote of confidence in [our] technology, and shows how important energy storage will be as we prioritize the reliability and resiliency of the grid for years to come,” said Curtis VanWalleghem, chief executive officer and co-founder of Hydrostor, the parent company of GEM A-CAES.
The project, which would be one of the world’s largest compressed air facilities, inked a $1 billion power purchase agreement in 2023 with Central Coast Community Energy (3CE), which serves more than 440,000 customers.
