The purpose of the NETL Project was to develop a diverse combination of distributed renewable
generation technologies and controls and demonstrate how the renewable generation could help manage
substation peak demand at the ATK Promontory plant site. The Promontory plant site is located in
the northwestern Utah desert approximately 25 miles west of Brigham City, Utah. The plant
encompasses 20,000 acres and has over 500 buildings. The ATK Promontory plant primarily
manufactures solid propellant rocket motors for both commercial and government launch systems.
The original project objectives focused on distributed generation; a 100 kW (kilowatt) wind
turbine, a 100 kW new technology waste heat generation unit, a 500 kW energy storage system, and an
intelligent system-wide automation system to monitor and control the renewable energy devices then
release the stored energy during the peak demand time. The original goal was to reduce peak demand
from the electrical utility company, Rocky Mountain Power (RMP), by 3.4%.
For a period of time we also sought to integrate our energy storage requirements with a flywheel
storage system (500 kW) proposed for the Promontory/RMP Substation. Ultimately the flywheel storage
system could not meet our project timetable, so the storage requirement was switched to a battery
storage system (300 kW.)
A secondary objective was to design/install a bi-directional customer/utility gateway application
for real-time visibility and communications between RMP, and ATK. This objective was not achieved
because of technical issues with RMP, ATK Information Technology Department’s stringent
requirements based on being a rocket motor manufacturing facility, and budget constraints.
Of the original objectives, the following were achieved:
• Installation of a 100 kW wind turbine.
• Installation of a 300 kW battery storage system.
• Integrated control system installed to offset electrical demand by releasing stored energy
from renewable sources during peak hours of the day. Control system also monitors the wind turbine
and battery storage system health, power output, and issues critical alarms.
Of the original objectives, the following were not achieved:
• 100 kW new technology waste heat generation unit.
• Bi-directional customer/utility gateway for real time visibility and communications between
RMP and ATK.
• 3.4% reduction in peak demand. 1.7% reduction in peak demand was realized instead.