World-first, salt-based energy storage system announced by N.B. Power in 2021 quietly dropped

An ambitious plan announced by N.B. Power two years ago to sponsor construction of a world first-of-its-kind salt-based energy storage system has been shelved indefinitely by the Crown corporation.

But unlike an earlier big idea — a hydrogen from seawater project that it lost $13 million on in 2019 — the utility says this time no funds were spent.

"N.B. Power did not invest any money in the project," wrote N.B. Power spokesperson Dominique Couture in an email to CBC News.

Less clear is whether the New Brunswick government escaped financial losses.

In October 2021, N.B. Power announced an initiative with the American company Malta Inc. to have a 100-megawatt energy storage facility built by 2024 that would be capable of discharging 1,000 megawatt hours of electricity over a 10-hour period. 

The plant proposed to take electricity from N.B. Power's transmission grid at minimal cost during low demand periods and convert it into heat to be stored in tanks of molten salt at temperatures up to 565 C.  

From there the heat was to be reconverted into electricity and sent back to the grid when needed. It was called an "exciting" idea by N.B. Power that would help it manage peak loads as well as even out the up-and-down electrical output of provincial windmills.

"This initiative demonstrates N.B. Power's leadership role in helping New Brunswick transition to a low-carbon economy," it said in its 2021 announcement.

By size, the project would have eclipsed the largest electricity storage system in Atlantic Canada several times over.  Saint John Energy currently claims that title with four utility-sized Tesla batteries that combined can store 7.5 megawatts of electricity. 

Although Malta has never built one of its energy storage plants, N.B. Power was confident enough that the unique technology would work; it took the unusual step of announcing both a projected starting date for the plant and likely employment levels.

"While still in the planning and development stage the facility is targeted to be in-service in 2024,"  said the announcement.

"Upon its completion, the 1,000 mwh (megawatt hour) facility would be one of the largest energy storage systems of its kind in the world, and lead to the creation of an estimated 225 new jobs during construction, and up to 15 during operation," 

However, little has been said about the plan by N.B. Power since and this summer in an updated "integrated resource plan" issued for its next 20 years, the salt-based energy storage plant was conspicuously absent.

In an email, Couture said N.B. Power came to view the project as too expensive and dropped it.