Castello Di Amorosa, an authentically-styled Tuscan Castle nestled amongst the vineyards of Napa Valley, offers tours, winemaking, and tastings. This unique destination is connected to the PG&E grid and has felt the effects of wildfires, Public Safety Power Shutoffs (PSPS) and the power distribution challenges California has faced. With the addition of 375 kW of solar and a 250 kW by 556 kWh energy storage system, along with an upgrade of the existing generator for paralleling capabilities, the facility no longer needs to worry about the lights going out on their valued guests, or on their valuable grapes.
When a utility grid failure is detected, the Generac ARC controller islands the microgrid system from the utility. With the hybrid mix of energy resources available, the ARC controller is able to coordinate them harmoniously allowing the microgrid at the Castello Winery to power the facility through multi-day outages.
When the microgrid is not providing resilient backup power to the facility, the Generac ARC controller continues to optimize the system around the utility rate, reducing energy usage during peak rates and limiting the facility demand seen by the utility, adding up to electricity bill savings every month.
Due to the utility transformer sizing, there is a utility export limit of 25 kW. When the solar is highly productive and the batteries are full, the ARC controller is able to send active curtailment setpoints to the solar inverters to meet the facility load while still falling under that utility export limit. As a conditionally-approved Performance Data Provider (PDP), Generac is able to help Castello qualify for the SGIP storage rebate program.
