Tesla Inc. today showed off recent activities in the virtual power plant (VPP) space at Tokyo’s Smart Grid Expo, with a view to bringing them at scale into the country’s rapidly changing energy market.

This week’s news-in-brief stories come from across Solar Media’s publishing channels.

Schneider Electric has partnered with Autogrid for a “grid management solution” that can incorporate and optimise diverse assets including customer-sited energy storage.

UK-based Gresham House Energy Storage Fund has sealed the deal on its latest battery optimisation agreement.

Energy storage company Moixa, together with automotive giant Honda, have launched a vehicle to grid (V2G) project at Islington Town Hall that will help to provide constraint management for the building, as well as facilitate a switch to electric vehicles.

Ørsted has appointed REMAP as its marketing agent for its flexible generation and revenue optimisation services in the UK.

HOMER Energy announced that it has been bought by global safety certification company UL, following the completion of the aquisition on 16 December.

Susan Kennedy has stepped down as CEO of Advanced Microgrid Solutions (AMS), with chief product officer Seyed Madaeni appointed to take her place.

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”.

Thanks to “innovative business models” and the combination of PV with batteries, Japan’s “solar boom” is far from over, market expert Izumi Kaizuka of RTS PV has said.