GE Ventures, the venture capital arm of US-headquartered multinational engineering group GE, has invested in German energy storage hardware and services provider Sonnen.

While parallels are often drawn between the solar and storage industries, financing energy storage projects is a lot more complex than simply “transposing” learnings from solar to batteries.

German luxury carmaker Mercedes Benz has officially launched a dedicated energy division, focusing on its range of lithium-ion storage battery systems, following a series of related announcements including tie-ups with inverter maker SMA.

Another period of growth in US energy storage was enjoyed in the first quarter of 2016, up by 127% year-over-year compared to the equivalent period in 2015, GTM Research has found.

The Solar Power Portal Awards, an annual celebration of the PV industry from Energy-Storage.News’ UK-based publisher, Solar Media, will include commercial and large-scale energy storage as a category for the first time this October.

A bill introduced in Congress last week that could apply an energy investment credit for storage systems in the US, has been welcomed by the US Energy Storage Association (ESA).

The signing of a contract to deploy batteries for dynamic frequency response in Britain is an indication that grid operators and the renewables industry can work together to benefit energy users, developer RES has said.

While seeming “tech breakthroughs” garner a great deal of media attention, the three key factors in determining the likely impact of storage tech companies are innovative technology, scalability and a proven track record, a Bloomberg New Energy Finance analyst has said.

While most of the press attention around decarbonising transport has centred on electric cars, Leclanché has supplied lithium-ion batteries to power a ferry in Latvia for an EU demonstration project.

The economic benefits of adding energy storage to solar in California at affordable multi-family dwellings could far outweigh the costs, even doubling savings on energy bills, a new report claims.