Advanced Energy Storage for California’s Critical Infrastructure Project
This project will develop a state-of-the-art clean energy storage backup system to serve critical infrastructure facilities to mitigate the health and safety risks from planned and unplanned power outages in California.
Caban Systems, Inc.
Recipient
Burlingame, CA
Recipient Location
13th
Senate District
21st
Assembly District
$768,727
Amount Spent
Active
Project Status
Project Update
In 2024, Caban made significant progress toward its project goals including: 1. Completing comprehensive research and development to integrate a hydrogen fuel cell into a lithium-ion battery storage cabinet; 2. Selected and procured one fuel cell system that fits our integration criteria; 3. Connected an edge controller unit to allow bi-directional communication, data collection and remote control of the unit to turn on and off in critical conditions
The project is now in the process of securing a validation test location at CSU-Los Angeles and a second fuel cell from Horizon. Once these processes have concluded, there is a clear path to completing the remaining tasks of the project.
The Issue
California Investor Owned Utility (IOU) ratepayers are increasingly vulnerable to electrical power outages that take critical systems offline and leave hundreds of thousands of Californians unable to communicate during emergencies. When critical systems lose power, people cannot receive alerts from emergency responders, access vital evacuation websites, or reach out to emergency contacts. The majority of Californians have no landline and rely solely on cell phones for public safety communications. The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) recently adopted a 72-hour backup requirement for wireless carriers to ensure a minimum level of service in high fire threat districts. Due to the lack of commercialized clean energy technologies, this likely will lead to increased deployment of gas- and diesel-powered generators, which will increase greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and harmful pollutants and exacerbate wildfire risks. There is an immediate need, therefore, to advance clean energy storage technologies that provide life-saving safety features, cost savings, emission reductions, wildfire risk reduction, and infrastructure resilience and reliability.
Project Innovation
The project will develop a state-of-the-art clean energy storage backup system to serve critical infrastructure facilities to mitigate the health and safety risks from planned and unplanned power outages, and to help the State of California meet its energy goals by reducing the use of fossil fuel generators. The Project will build upon Caban Systems' (Caban) successful California Energy Commission (CEC)-funded Modular Battery Platform Project by integrating a commercially available clean hydrogen (H2) fuel cell into its energy storage and energy management platforms.
Project Goals
Project Benefits
This project will lead to technological advancement and breakthroughs to overcome barriers to the achievement of the State of California's statutory energy goals by further advancing the development of a state-of-the-art hybrid clean energy storage plus clean fuel cell technology backup system that will improve public safety, lower costs, and reduce emissions. Ratepayers rely on critical infrastructure for communication to keep them connected during power outages often related to wildfires and severe weather events. Currently, critical infrastructure facilities are often forced to rely on gas- and diesel-powered generators for back-up power, which exacerbate wildfire risks and release greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and harmful pollutants, impeding the State of California’s energy goals. This illuminates the need to advance clean energy storage technologies.
Affordability
The project will lower costs for IOUs, and thus ratepayers by reducing the need for grid extensions to critical infrastructure in remote locations.
Environmental Sustainability
The project will provide environmental benefits by reducing or eliminating the need for diesel- and gas-powered backup generators for critical infrastructure.
Reliability
The project will develop a state-of-the-art clean energy storage backup system that will increase the reliability of critical infrastructure during power outages and peak grid hours.
Safety
The project will help increase safety by providing a reliable, data-driven solution to maintain wireless capabilities during Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS) events for up to 72 hours. This should allow decision-makers greater flexibility and assurance when declaring PSPS events.
Key Project Members
Alexandra Rasch
