Energy Storage

Gigawatts a-go-go this week as Turkey, Algeria and Vietnam all toy with those magical GWs, while in more mature markets German storage figures provided reasons for optimism and Blattner Energy took the top spot for U.S. EPCs.

It took a couple of tweets, and at least one one-hour long phone call, but it seems pretty clear that Tesla founder, CEO and billionaire Elon Musk has helped turn the debate around energy policy in Australia on its head.

The French energy giant keeps expanding into the renewable energy business. Its France-based unit EDF Energies Nouvelles will build PV plants totaling 23.7 MW, while its US division EDF EN has created a new subsidiary for distributed solar and storage projects up to 30 MW.

The German battery manufacturer and the Korean industrial conglomerate have unveiled a new high-voltage storage system. The device has an efficiency of 98% and functions just as well with a low voltage of 48 volts as with a high voltage of 1,000 volts.

Distributed storage costs: With the average payback cost of a home battery storage system sticking stubbornly at around ten years, skeptics remain unconvinced that mass-market adoption of distributed storage is on the cards any time soon. So what measures is the industry taking to expedite cost reductions, improve storage technology, and shift the conversation from a ‘nice to have’ to a ‘must have’?

The British archipelago of islands to become global testbed for Smart Islands project that aims to provide model for use of electric vehicles and home batteries in a smart energy system.

The French energy giant is offering to acquire Innogy, the renewable energy unit of German power provider RWE. Innogy acquired German developer Belectric and its huge solar power plant portfolio in January.

German car maker BMW will provide Vattenfall with 1,000 lithium-ion car batteries. Vattenfall will use the batteries, which are also used for the vehicle BMW i3, for storage projects at wind farms.

Amid the innovation on display in Portugal, the optimism in Japan and the, well, eagerness in Norway were stories of takeovers, Tesla and storage that shaped yet another fascinating week in the global solar PV industry.

Tesla founder Elon Musk has thrown down a challenge to the Australian government, saying that he can build a battery array capable of resolving South Australia’s energy stability issues within 100 days. Musk took to social media to make the challenge, saying that Tesla could develop a 100 MWh system to stabilize the state’s electricity network, within 100 days of a contract being signed, or that he’ll provide it for free.