Automation and engineering group ABB has signed on to become a supplier to a planned European lithium-ion battery ‘Gigafactory’ for Swedish start-up Northvolt.

Indian prime minister Narendra Modi has launched a new programme to electrify every willing household in the country by 31 December 2018, using solar, energy storage batteries and LED lighting.

PBES Norway and Norwegian Solar AS have agreed to a partnership deal that will offer PBES’ energy storage systems to support PV projects in global markets.

Australian homes and businesses will soon be able to use renewable energy stored in their batteries to bid into a local energy market and provide a range of grid services using a new software platform backed by the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA).

Duke Energy announced plans to install North Carolina’s two largest battery storage systems — which stands as a US$30 million investment as part of Duke Energy’s Western Carolinas Modernisation Plan.

Solar entrepreneur and financier Jigar Shah probably requires little introduction. The SunEdison founder and former CEO is now president at Generate Capital, a project financing venture for sustainable infrastructure investment. Shah spoke with Andy Colthorpe about Generate Capital’s latest solar-plus-storage projects for a school district in California, as well as sharing his thoughts on the economics of energy storage today.

Shifting responsibility for product safety onto manufacturers, rather than installers, of residential energy storage systems would be a positive step forward for Australia’s industry, the country’s Clean Energy Council has said.

Australian battery company Redflow Limited has repeated its largest-ever sale of its ZBM2 zinc-bromine flow batteries after receiving an international order worth about US$600,000.

Legislation recently introduced in California to cut red tape and reduce permitting times for energy storage systems and currently awaiting the state Governor’s rubber stamp could also halve the costs associated with paperwork, commercial system provider Stem has said.

While lithium-ion is rapidly racing ahead to become the “de facto grid storage solution” and is the most popular technology choice by far, vendors of other types of batteries are also targeting the market, with varying degrees of success.