The German solar industry association, BSW Solar, has created an extensive report on safety for lithium-ion battery-based energy storage systems for home use, and plans to publish an English language version next week.

Toyota will put a commercial fuel cell vehicle (FCV), which it claims can be refuelled in less than five minutes, onto the market in Japan, Europe and the USA from as early as mid-December, the carmaker has announced.

Imergy Power Systems, the California-based energy storage specialist, has received an order for four of its ESP5 vanadium flow batteries from Hawaiian renewables firm, Energy Research Systems.

Toshiba is trialling a PV hybrid storage system in Japan for use in emergency situations.

US battery and energy storage system manufacturer Aquion Energy has closed a US$36.8 million financing round, which it will use for purposes including scaling up production and deploying storage projects internationally.

Axion Power International, a maker of lead carbon battery systems, has been selected to supply energy storage and frequency regulation to a 9.1MW solar farm in Pennsylvania, the company has announced.

In the UK, the National Grid has recently warned the government that its capacity to supply electricity is at a seven-year low due to recent generator closures, fires and outages. The margin of capacity over demand is expected to be just 4% this winter.

Zinc redox flow batteries could be a “viable substitute” for simple cycle peaking power plants in the US, especially as the increase of solar penetration adds concerns over grid stability, according to a new whitepaper.

Nine companies conducting research and development projects in energy storage have partnered with, and are set to receive financial support from, the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA).

Sharp, ABB, SMA and Bosch are among the big names readying new energy storage products for the UK PV market. Andy Colthorpe caught up with them at the Solar Energy UK show to find out what tech fits best for the UK’s nascent storage sector.