While the renewable energy industry has suffered significant blows such as loss of employment during the COVID-19 crisis, venture capital (VC) funding into the battery energy storage sector in the first quarter of this year nonetheless saw a significant increase over the previous year’s equivalent period.

The island of Ireland’s battery storage pipeline has swelled to nearly 2.5GW, a new report unveiled by Energy-Storage.news publisher Solar Media can reveal. Here, the report’s author and analyst at Solar Media Lauren Cook dives into the detail and explores what’s driving that growth.

“We are happy about the Italian government’s decision that allows us to fully resume business operations in Italy,” Manz AG CEO Martin Drasch has said, following a ruling that deems lithium-ion battery production to be of ‘strategic importance’ for the European country.

UK-based stock exchange listed investor Gresham House Energy Storage Fund has conditionally agreed to acquire a 50MW battery storage project.

Despite a subdued year in 2019 and a challenging start to 2020 caused by the COVID-19 outbreak, the outlook for energy storage remains strong, says Julian Jansen of market research group IHS Markit, taking a deep dive across segments and geographies.

“The elimination of solar energy’s intermittency and ensuring its 24-hour availability at grid-competitive cost is the holy grail and RayGen has found it”.

A 5MW / 20MWh energy storage system built around the batteries BMW uses in its i3 electric vehicles (EVs) will help integrate renewable energy into the electric grid in Uppsala, Sweden.

Ensuring battery systems used in conjunction with solar perform safely and optimally is essential in the continued roll-out of storage technology. Robert Puto and Gerhard Klein of TÜV SÜD examine independent technical assessments that must be undertaken before a storage system is built.

The MSc in Renewable Energy and Energy Management and MSc Energy Storage at Ulster University provide the opportunity for graduates and professionals to acquire knowledge of renewable energy, energy management and energy storage solutions to develop skills appropriate to its practice.

Ministry for Ecological Transition and Demographic Challenges (MITECO) said it will be receiving comments for 15 days after the current COVID-19 crisis-related state of emergency the country has declared is over.