Battery Storage System Install Costs

I'm working on modeling a behind the meter Battery Energy Storage System that can has the ability to produce 100MW per hour for 4 hours. A 400MWh system.

Under Battery Cell and System I have set Desired bank power at 1000,000kW (100MW) and set Desired bank capacity at 4 hrs. Under the installation costs under Direct Capital Costs there are two different values to calculate Total direct cost, Battery pack and Battery power. The battery cost per capacity is default at $260.28/kWh and the Battery cost per kW is default at $964/kW. 

Throughout my research and comparing to past projects I'm finding the $260/kWh to be an accurate cost assessment of a BESS, but nowhere have I found information to corroborate the $964/kW which doubles the expected cost of the project. Are both numbers meant to be included in this calculation or is meant to be one or the other? Can anyone explain what these two different values are meant to represent?

Hi Waylon,

The source for SAM's default installation and operating costs is the NLR Annual Technology Baseline (ATB): atb.nlr.gov/electricity/2024/technologies .

The default costs are intended as a starting point for your analysis. You should refine your cost assumptions as you develop your analysis.

SAM models battery costs in both $/kW and $/kWh so that when you change the size of the battery (hours of storage, maximum discharge rate, or both), the costs scale as appropriate.

As described in the ATB documentation for battery costs, the default $/kWh costs are associated with the battery pack and $/kW costs are associated with battery balance-of-system (BOS) costs.

You can choose to represent the battery costs using only $/kWh of battery storage capacity and setting the $/kW costs to zero if that is appropriate for your analysis.

Best regards,
Paul.