Solar Media’s Liam Stoker and Andy Colthorpe are back for episode three of the Solar Media Podcast after what’s been a bumper month for energy storage.

Advanced battery technology company Saft has executed its first projects in Australia, installing around 2MWh of battery energy storage systems (BESS) at 13 sites in Queensland.

The rapid acceleration in energy storage deployment expected over the coming years will require innovation in the quality and safety standards underpinning new battery and associated technologies. VDE’s Jan Geder looks at the technical work underway to ensure the coming storage boom has firm bankability and insurability foundations.

The Nobel Foundation recognised not only the role of lightweight, portable battery technology for mobile phones, laptops and latterly electric vehicles, but also that it “can also store significant amounts of energy from solar and wind power, making possible a fossil fuel-free society”.

KORE Lithium Technologies Inc (KORE Power), a US headquartered manufacturer of nickel manganese cobalt (NMC) battery racks for the utility-scale stationary energy storage market, has retained renewable energy investor CohnReznick Capital as its Investment Bank of Record.

Australian renewables investor Lyon Group has penned an agreement with China Huadian Corporation which will see the duo co-develop and invest in power-plus-battery energy storage systems across Australia, China and other Asian markets.

Distributed renewables and energy storage are now the cheapest form of baseload power and if Western Australia’s remote areas can benefit from that, we can all benefit, argues David Martin, founder of energy trading platform provider Power Ledger.

Australian technology firm Power Ledger is to launch an eight-month pilot project of its peer-to-peer energy trading technology after penning an agreement with Malaysia’s Sustainable Energy Development Authority (SEDA).

New technologies and designs aimed at driving down the cost of energy storage facilities are currently the focus of intense industry R&D. Sara Verbruggen reports on DC coupling, an emerging system architecture that many believe will soon become the industry standard.

Engie has been hired by Guam’s state electricity utility to build two solar-plus-storage plants with a combined capacity of 50MWp/300MWh on the Micronesian island.