ATK Launch Systems - Final Technical Report
Sept. 15, 2014
ATK Launch Systems
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 Departments stringent requirements based on being a rocket motor manufacturing facility, and budget constraints.
