BMW unveils energy storage system at Electric Vehicle Symposium & Exhibition

After Tesla announced its Powerwall and Powerpack stationary battery packs to power homes, BMW has developed an energy storage system of its own, in alliance with Germany's Beck Automation.

The company showcased its offering, which uses batteries from the BMW i3, at the Electric Vehicle Symposium & Exhibition 29 (EVS29) in Montreal. The system will be available in 22-kilowatt-hour and 33-kWh sizes, which correspond to the battery-pack sizes of the current i3 and the longer-range 2017 model that will hit the market this year.

According to BMW there was enough capacity to operate ''a variety of appliances and entertainment devices'' in a home for up to 24 hours.

According to the car maker, its system would be the first on the market to incorporate ''second-life'' batteries. Second-life batteries are older batteries removed from electric cars after losing too much storage capacity, but still had plenty of usable capacity left. BMW would initially use new batteries only, and mix in second-life batteries as they became available.

BMW said in its press release that it was ''the first automotive manufacturer to utilize a complete automotive high-voltage battery for energy storage.''

With the move, BMW joins ranks with others automakers who had entered the energy storage space including Tesla, Daimler, and Nissan. (See: Nissan announces vehicle-to-grid trial of energy storage system in the UK) ''The remarkable advantage for BMW customers in using BMW i3 batteries as a plug-and-play storage application is the ability to tap into an alternative resource for residential and commercial backup power, thus using renewable energy much more efficiently, and enabling additional revenues from the energy market,'' said Cliff Fietzek, Manager Connected eMobility at BMW of North America, www.hybridcars.com reported.

BMW had tested its electric vehicle batteries for stationary power storage in numerous research projects. In 2011, batteries which were earlier used in MINI  E test fleet were successfully implemented in a stationary project and in 2013, BMW and the University of San Diego installed a micro grid application with Battery 2nd Life MINI E batteries.