The Minnesota Public Utilities Commission (MPUC) has approved a 200MW expansion of utility Xcel Energy’s Capacity*Connect virtual power plant (VPP) programme.

BESS platform NGEN has started building an 85M/170MWh BESS in Austria, while Foresight Group and the EBRD have invested in development platforms in Germany and Lithuania.

Residential energy storage startup Base Power is collaborating with utility Denton County Electric Cooperative (CoServ) to deploy 100MW of residential energy storage across North Texas, US.

In this Energy-Storage.news roundup, FlexGen updates its EMS, LandGate launches a BESS site selection tool, ON.energy and Shoals target AI data centres, and Sunrun has a successful season of dispatching energy with PG&E.

New South Wales (NSW) energy minister Penny Sharpe has directed ASL to deliver a firming capacity tender addressing forecast energy shortfalls from 2033-34.

Residential energy storage startup Base Power and utility El Paso Electric Company (EPE) have announced a new residential distributed energy resource (DER) pilot programme in Texas, US.

Fox ESS and Origin Energy have partnered to enable home battery storage systems to participate in Origin’s Loop VPP programme in Australia.

Tesla is set to officially launch its first vehicle-to-grid (V2G) programme in Texas, US, soon with eyes to expand into California.

Home battery storage and virtual power plant (VPP) specialist Lunar Energy has raised US$102 million in an oversubscribed Series D financing round led by B Capital and Prelude Ventures.