The residential energy storage market in the US has just enjoyed one of its biggest growth spurts so far, although action is mostly centred in specific states with supportive policies and conditions.
Britain’s transmission system operator (TSO) National Grid has said it wants a new procurement process for ‘black start’ capabilities up and running by the mid-2020s, and wants it to involve renewables and battery energy storage.
JLM Energy, a US maker of residential ’microstorage’ systems that pair with individual solar panels, is leaning on its US$25 million project finance fund to develop larger storage projects for commercial businesses.
Battery storage is a “necessity” for Hawaii to reach its 100% renewable energy by 2045 target, leading to electric cooperative KIUC becoming the top-ranked US utility for watts of energy storage deployed per customer in 2017.
California’s recent droughts and ongoing need to economise water use have inspired more commercial energy storage at a local water board, with ENGIE Storage delivering a project for the San Diego Water Authority.
San Diego Gas & Electric (SDG&E), one of California’s three main investor-owned utilities (IOUs), said this week that it will add resilience and backup capabilities to public sector buildings through the procurement of “up to 166MW” of energy storage.
Steps taken in California to enable energy storage systems to provide multiple services and to ‘stack revenues’ are “an essential starting point” for the industry, the head of California’s Energy Storage Alliance (CESA) has said.
The US’ two leading states in solar and energy storage, New York and California, have taken steps towards valuing the locational and time-of-use value of distributed energy resources and other states should follow, the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) has said.
