BYD, DNV GL, Tesla, Schneider Electric and SMA Solar are among the names confirmed to attend Solar Media’s Energy Storage 100, a networking event in London celebrating the nascent energy storage industry.

Many have predicted 2016 will be the year when energy storage starts to live up to its hype. Andy Colthorpe canvased views from some of the leading figures and companies in the sector on the next developments a market that could help take solar and other renewables to the next level.

Roundup: Activist-entrepreneur Danny Kennedy seeks innovative solutions for international showcase, Statoil and Scotland look at batteries for offshore wind, Tesla stops selling 10kWh Powerwall.

The UK remains on track for a big push on energy storage with the latest budget backing changes proposed in a key report and an imminent consultation looking to shake-up the role of network operators.

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.

Puerto Rico’s financially troubled electric power authority PREPA will install a large-scale battery park at a 10MW PV farm, to help integrate the farm’s output and other renewables.

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.

Energy storage solutions combined with hybrid solar PV plants and diesel generators will soon benefit communities in two starkly contrasting locations – in a luxury Maldives resort and in Australia’s Aboriginal community.

Ontario’s successes in creating and fostering a market and industry for energy storage owes a lot to policy makers taking a coherent, long-term view of its entire energy sector, according to a representative of Canada’s only energy storage trade association.

Recharge A/S, an investment fund specialising in renewables, will take a 50.1% stake in a €24 million (US$26.7 million) micro grid on a remote Portuguese island that could prove the validity of such projects as an asset class.