Rolls-Royce In Microgrid Cooperation

Rolls-Royce and European energy provider GETEC have signed a cooperation agreement that will intensify their collaboration on the design, concept, construction and operation of decentralized energy supply systems in Europe. No financial or operating information was included in the announcement.

“The successful and trusting collaboration we have enjoyedwith GETEC in the course of the last few years has introduced us to deepen the relationship even further and together offer our customers sustainable energy solutions,” said Andreas Görtz, vice president Power Generation Business at Rolls-Royce Power Systems.

The aim of the collaboration is to supply and operate efficient and environmentally friendly decentralized energy systems, such as CHP plants, on- and off-grid microgrid solutions, along with energy-related services and contracting. Both partners will also jointly develop new solutionsfor the supply of energy to industrial companies, customers from the property sector and other areas that are tailored in each case to the specific need.

“The energy world of tomorrow is decentralized, efficient and innovative” said Thomas Wagner, CEO of the GETEC Group. “These are characteristics that both GETEC and Rolls-Royce with its MTU Onsite Energy brand embody to the same degree.

“It also means that the partners not only match in technological terms, but also in terms of their values. With this cooperation agreement, therefore, we intend to provide our joint customers with optimum economic and sustainable solutions and in this way reduce their carbon footprint.”

In the course of the last few months, the collaboration between Rolls-Royce and GETEC has already been demonstrated with the design concept and commissioning of a new microgrid for the German automotive components supplier Winkelmann in Ahlen.

A total of six CHP modules and an instrumentation and control system from MTU Onsite Energy have been integrated into the plant. To compensate for production-related load variations of up to 1.5 MW in a matter of seconds, GETEC and Rolls-Royce have additionally connected two flywheel storage systems and a battery storage system to the system.

In total, over 9 MW of electrical power and just under 10MW of thermal output are available for the operation of the industrial company. This has enabled Winkelmann Powertrain Components GmbH to disconnect itself completely from the public grid and operate its own energy system.