BESS: A New Way Forward For Powering Tower Cranes

In particular focus is tower cranes, one of the largest power drawing machines on a construction site.

Often too powerful to connect to the grid, contractors typically turn to diesel generators to power on-site cranes. But they’re an inefficient and costly solution.

With access to the grid, a battery energy storage system can deliver constant, reliable and environmentally friendly energy source for powering tower cranes.

Here’s why.

Tower cranes only require shorts bursts of high power for lifting. The rest of the time, the diesel generators powering them are often sitting idle or running underloaded.

Battery energy storage systems like the AMPD Enertainer are specially designed to handle surging load behaviours of construction equipment like tower cranes.

The Enertainer acts as a drop in solution to either supplement or completely replace diesel generators on construction sites. It can power any type of heavy electrical equipment, but is particularly well suited to powering high-power equipment with intermittent loads, like tower cranes.

Here’s 4 reasons why:

Underloaded diesel generators burning through countless amounts of fuel will seriously impact project emissions and may result in over expenditure in fuel budgets.

Units like the Enertainer use lithium-ion battery technology to replace diesel as baseload power. The batteries power the cranes, only calling on a small backup generator or the grid to charge the unit when the battery depletes.

With BESS, construction companies are more resilient to fluctuating diesel costs and often downsize their existing generator fleet. Not to mention it removes the hassle of disruptive refuelling, meaning minimal downtime for your site.

On recent construction projects, we’ve seen up to 7,000L of diesel savings per month.

Using lithium-ion battery technology, the AMPD Enertainer has a carbon footprint 70-90% lower than a diesel generator. There’s zero direct NOx, PM or SO fumes from the unit, making it the ideal low carbon option for powering tower cranes.

The Enertainer has a noise footprint 30x less than a diesel generator. This makes it a popular choice for urban construction sites, allowing them to meet their power requirements while keeping noise to a minimum.

The Enertainer’s compact, modular design is ideal for space-constrained construction sites. Unlike diesel generators, it emits zero exhaust fumes, so it’s safe for use in confined or tightly packed sites with poor ventilation.

In an ongoing construction project, we deployed the Enertainer to address on-site obstacles like restrictive space and refuelling access for sustainability focused developer Erben.

Blue Diamond Machinery has been powering the industries that power Australia’s economy for over a decade. Now, we’re helping them transition to an emission-free future. 

Whatever stage your business is at, we have the know-how and expertise to recommend the right solution.  

For advice on taking the first steps to reduce your onsite emissions without compromising productivity or efficiency, get in touch with the team today.