For over a decade, net metering has been a crucial component of the economic puzzle for renewable energy, allowing both residential and commercial rooftop PV owners to realise favourable returns on their solar equipment investment. John Merritt of Ideal Power Conversion looks at some of the arguments and counter-arguments and says solar-plus-storage could be the natural successor to the policy – starting at commercial and industrial (C&I) level.

Two initiatives have got underway in Europe, one in Germany and the other in Britain, aimed at accelerating battery development for electric vehicles and stationary storage respectively, while vacuum cleaner company Dyson has pledged a US$1.44 billion commitment to batteries – for cordless cleaning devices.

Energy Storage News visited the offices and production facilities of Sunamp, a maker of heat batteries, in East Lothian, Scotland to hear how the systems are made and how they were developed.

Germany-based inverter firm SMA Solar technology has qualified lithium-based energy storage systems from commercial battery system provider Tesvolt for use with SMA’s Sunny Island battery inverter.

German utility E.On recently joined forces with German PV module and storage manufacturer Solarwatt. Energy Storage News catches up with Felix Brauer, training coordinator at SolarWatt, to discuss the partnership in detail and the benefits of a DC-coupled battery system.

Lithium-ion energy storage manufacturer Leclanché has secured new finance from ACE & Company in Switzerland as it looks to double its revenue.

The head of an Australian solar installer has criticised Tesla’s marketing of its residential energy storage devices, claiming that potential end customers have been given unrealistically low expectations on the system’s pricing.

The Japanese city in which the manufacturing bases of lithium-ion battery makers including Panasonic, Hitachi Maxcell and GS Yuasa are located will play host to the world’s biggest energy storage battery and system testing facility to date.

The US energy storage market grew 243% last year, making 2015 the biggest year of any on record for storage, according to GTM Research.

The anticipated growth in stationary energy storage will be dependent on a significant decrease in costs. Florian Mayr and Hannes Beushausen explain how the relative costs of different storage technologies in different applications can be compared and understood as an intial step towards increasing competitiveness.