An Ontario college will use a large-scale lithium-ion battery system from Wartsila to “minimise” its Global Adjustment Charge (GAC), the Canadian province’s means of paying for grid infrastructure as well as green energy policies that can constitute as much as 60% of monthly electricity bills.

Bordesholm in Germany became a showcase for how entire communities could switch over to renewable energy with the backing of energy storage capacity.

What is thought to be Canada’s first virtual power plant (VPP), aggregating the capabilities of a small fleet of solar PV-plus-storage systems with energy management software, has been deployed in Ontario.

The importance of technologies and services that enable effective energy storage including software and systems integration, is set to grow more than 30 times over in the next nine years, a new report claims.

Energy storage is likely to be worth “tens of billion dollars in the next five to 10 years” across a number of global regions, according to executives at solar microinverter firm Enphase.

Integrated US photovoltaic energy company SunPower’s solar panels will be sold as part of a package that includes energy management software and energy storage capabilities to residential customers in the US and Australia from early next year.

Solar microinverter specialist Enphase has announced its first move into energy storage, launching an energy management system which includes an AC battery, at the Solar Power International show in Las Vegas this week.