Portsmouth International Port (PIP) on the south coast of England has announced it will pilot a new smart energy system that includes a novel energy storage solution.

Another three developers with more than a gigawatt-hour of wins in Hawaiian Electric’s (HECO’s) massive solar-plus-storage and standalone energy storage tenders have gone public with size and location details of their proposed projects.

News in brief from around the world in energy storage.

The contract is for the 35MW hybrid York solar farm designed and constructed by developer GRIDSERVE, which was completed late last year.

There was a near-70% increase in capacity of operational energy storage projects in China paired with solar energy from 2018 to 2019, according to figures recently published by the China Energy Storage Alliance (CNESA).

Battery energy storage deployed at Cleve Hill, the largest solar farm planned in the UK to date, will be installed and operated in line with a safety plan agreed with local fire services and the national Health and Safety Executive.

Storage system providers EnerSys and NeoVolta have made significant changes to their Boards of Directors and Advisors respectively, while US large-scale energy storage independent power producer (IPP) Key Capture Energy has appointed a new director of technology.

A £31 million (US$38.06 million) demonstrator project in the UK, integrating heat, transport and energy is to progress despite COVID-19 restrictions.

The European Union’s European Investment Bank (EIB) has affirmed its commitment to supporting a “pan-European battery industry”, while plans of the UK’s first full cycle battery cell gigafactory have been unveiled.

While utility Hawaiian Electric (HECO) stands poised to announce the finalists of its recent massive procurement of solar-plus-storage and standalone energy storage projects, developers with winning bids seem determined to steal the utility’s thunder.