A solar-storage microgrid system at the Kaiser Permanente’s Richmond Medical Center in California hospital has the potential to reduce energy bills by as much as 50 percent, according to an article on the Microgrid Knowledge website.

The microgrid is the first in California to connect renewable energy to a hospital’s pre-existing, diesel-fueled, back-up power system and may be the first, on-site microgrid in California.

The Richmond Medical Center microgrid combines a 250-kW solar PV-parking lot canopy; a 1-MW lithium-ion battery energy storage system; an existing, on-site heat and power system and real-time analytics linked to the high-performance data center at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, Co.

The microgrid can operate in island mode, automatically disconnecting from the utility grid and supplying power for critical hospital needs for three hours or longer.

Read the article.