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North America / Commercial & demonstration

Mesa Del Sol Microgrid

Current status, energy mix, organizations, suppliers, equipment, controls, reported specifications, and project updates—with source-level citations.

CoverageDetailed public record
Named organizations19
System facts30
Sources reviewed9
Evidence reviewed2026-07-20

This record covers NEDO's Albuquerque Business District Smart Grid Demonstration at Mesa del Sol's Aperture Center, not PNM's separate Prosperity solar-storage facility about 2 km away. The roughly 400 kW commercial-building microgrid combines 50 kW of PV, a 240 kW gas-engine generator, 80 kW of phosphoric-acid fuel cells, and a lead-acid battery rated about 90 kW discharge/160 kWh, plus unusually extensive chilled- and hot-water storage. The Japan-U.S. demonstration ran from 2012 through March 2014; ownership of the equipment then transferred to the University of New Mexico, which has continued to use it as a research testbed.

Research status
Commissioned in May 2012; the formal NEDO demonstration ended in March 2014 and the equipment transferred to UNM in April 2014. A 2020 UNM-Siemens agreement identified it as an operating research testbed, and a UNM dataset contains 13 months of measurements through April 2023. No later public asset-condition or availability report was found, so operation is evidenced through 2023 but 2026 health of each generator, cell stack, and battery is unverified.
Historical classification
Commercial
Reported capacity
400 kW
Coordinates
34.98664, -106.61324
Evidence note: “Every company” cannot be proven from public material alone. This page lists every organization found in the recovered record and reviewed sources, preserves unknown roles, and explicitly marks undisclosed controller or equipment details.
Report missing evidenceResearch methodology

Project delivery

Who was involved in Mesa Del Sol Microgrid?

19 publicly identified organizations. Where a recovered source named a participant without explaining its work, the role remains explicitly unspecified.

Organization

DOE

Publicly named participant; role not specified in the recovered record [1]

Organization

Forest City Enterprises

Publicly named participant; role not specified in the recovered record [1]

Organization

Fuji Electric

Supplied the phosphoric-acid fuel-cell system. [3]

Organization

Furukawa Battery and Furukawa Electric

Furukawa Battery supplied the lead-acid battery; Furukawa Electric supplied its management system. [3]

Organization

Meidensha Corporation

Supplied the PV power-conditioning system. [3]

Organization

Mesa del Sol

Development owner and host of the Aperture Center demonstration site. [3]

Organization

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries

Supplied the gas-engine generator and associated controls. [3]

Organization

NEDO

Publicly named participant; role not specified in the recovered record [1]

Organization

New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO)

Japanese program sponsor and funder of the Albuquerque demonstration. [2][3]

Organization

Public Service Company of New Mexico (PNM)

Local utility and U.S. demonstration partner; operated the separate Prosperity PV-storage system used in coordination tests. [3][2]

Organization

Sandia

Publicly named participant; role not specified in the recovered record [1]

Organization

Sandia National Laboratories

U.S. technical/research partner. [3]

Organization

Sharp

Designed and procured the photovoltaic system and evaluated its performance. [3]

Organization

Shimizu

Publicly named participant; role not specified in the recovered record [1]

Organization

Shimizu Corporation

Overall microgrid integrator; supplied BEMS1, thermal storage/HVAC integration, site management, and verification. [3][2]

Organization

Siemens Industry

Entered a 2020 agreement with UNM to collaborate at the UNM-owned microgrid testbed. [6]

Organization

Tokyo Gas

Developed BEMS2 and distributed-energy-resource coordination algorithms. [3][2]

Organization

Toshiba

Responsible for the utility-side energy-management system and coordination with PNM's separate system. [3]

Organization

University of New Mexico (UNM)

U.S. research participant and owner/operator after the April 2014 equipment transfer. [5][6][7]

System evidence

Energy mix, capacity, and specifications

Values can describe different project phases, generation sources, storage systems, or other components. Source citations are attached to each figure so discrepancies remain visible.

KW Solar
50 [1]
KW Gas/Diesel
240 [1]
KW Fuel Cell
80 [1]
Storage
90/160 KW/KWH [1]
Site and load
Aperture Center, a three-story commercial building of approximately 7,000 m² with an approximately 400 kW electrical load. [2]
Photovoltaics
50 kW on-site PV. Do not add the separate PNM Prosperity facility's 500 kW PV to this nameplate. [2][3]
Dispatchable generation
240 kW natural-gas engine-generator plus 80 kW of phosphoric-acid fuel cells (shown as 60 kW + 20 kW in NEDO's configuration figure). [2]
Battery storage
Lead-acid battery, 160 kWh; NEDO describes approximately 50 kW charge and 90 kW discharge capability. Some summaries shorten this to 90 kW/160 kWh. [2][8]
Thermal plant
70 USRT air-cooled chiller, 20 USRT absorption chiller, 75 m³ chilled-water tank, and 110 m³ hot-water tank. [2]
Demonstration period
System opened May 17, 2012; verification ran for two years through March 2014 following installation from October 2011 to April 2012. [2][3]
Demonstrated power quality
After two years of refinement, BEMS1 held point-of-common-coupling power to about 2 kW standard deviation. During island tests voltage remained within 480 V ±10%, while frequency remained within 60 Hz ±0.3 Hz more than 98% of the time. [2]
Program investment and transferred value
UNM described NEDO's broader Albuquerque project as a US$22 million investment; UNM regents later recorded approximately US$15 million of equipment transferred in April 2014. These refer to different scopes and should not be treated as conflicting construction-cost estimates. [4][5]

Controls and hardware

Equipment and controller details

Manufacturer and model are shown only when a source names them. Generic descriptions are not converted into guessed product assignments.

01

Microgrid/BEMS controls

Shimizu Corporation — BEMS1

Building-energy-management controller for PCC power smoothing, economic dispatch, islanding, and thermal/electrical coordination. [2][3]

02

Distributed-generation controller

Tokyo Gas — BEMS2

Alternative algorithm set evaluated on common hardware; coordinated the gas engine, fuel cell, battery, and the separate PNM facility. [2]

03

Gas engine-generator

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries

240 kW natural-gas unit with control equipment. [3][2]

04

Fuel cell

Fuji Electric

80 kW total phosphoric-acid fuel-cell generation. [3][2]

05

Battery

Furukawa Battery

160 kWh lead-acid bank; battery-management system supplied by Furukawa Electric. [3][2]

06

PV power conditioning

Meidensha Corporation

Power-conditioning equipment for the 50 kW PV array; exact model was not disclosed. [3]

07

Controllable test load

Model not publicly disclosed

100 kW dummy load included in the demonstration configuration. [2]

Technical record

Architecture, performance, and project updates

Concise technical facts, milestones, operating results, and later developments. Dated notes distinguish historical design claims from current evidence.

  • Storage

    900 kW Lead Acid Batteries Capacity [1]

  • Storage

    160 kWh Lead Acid Battery Storage [1]

  • Storage

    Thermal Storage [1]

  • Generation

    – 80 kW fuel cells [1]

  • Generation

    – 50 kW PV system [1]

  • Generation

    – 240 kW gas-engine generator [1]

  • Identity boundary

    PNM's Prosperity installation, roughly 2 km from Aperture Center, was coordinated by BEMS2 but was a separate utility asset. NEDO text cites 500 kW PV and 500 kW/500 kWh storage for that facility; it is not part of Mesa del Sol's on-site nameplate. [2]

  • Control result

    Coordinating the gas engine and fuel cell with storage reduced the modeled storage capacity required for PV smoothing by about 14%; the study estimated up to 17.7% with low communications delay. [2]

  • Transfer performance

    NEDO reports grid/island switching and reconnection without instantaneous interruption in the tested configuration. [2]

  • Recent research evidence

    The 2023 UNM dataset contains 18 measured features for power, voltage, frequency, and temperature over 13 months, providing stronger operating evidence than undated project-directory listings. [7]

  • Energy mix limitation

    No audited annual generation by source was found. The 50 kW PV array is small relative to the approximately 400 kW building load, while grid power, gas generation, and fuel cells provide the balance; battery and thermal storage shift energy rather than generate it. [2]

Provenance

9 sources

Primary owner, government, university, supplier, and engineering sources are preferred. Archived references preserve claims whose original pages moved or disappeared.

  1. [1]
    Recovered Microgrid Projects record

    Internet Archive · Archived source · captured 2021-04-20

  2. [2]
  3. [3]
  4. [4]
  5. [5]
    UNM Board of Regents Meeting E-book, June 13, 2014

    University of New Mexico · Primary source

  6. [6]
  7. [7]
  8. [8]
    Mesa del Sol Microgrid

    Microgrid Symposiums · Secondary research

  9. [9]
    Mesa del Sol Microgrid (archived project page)

    MicrogridProjects.com via Internet Archive · Archived source

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