First developed by NASA, flow batteries are a potential answer to storing solar – and wind – for eight to 10 hours, far beyond what is commonly achieved today with lithium-ion. In the first of a two-part special report, Andy Colthorpe learns what the flow battery industry faces in the fight for commercialisation.

Volume 15 of PV Tech Power, from our publisher Solar Media, has just hit the virtual shelves – and the quarterly technical journal is free to download from the PV Tech site.

ESS Inc, US maker of the only flow battery that uses a battery chemistry based on iron and saltwater electrolytes, is making its first incursion into the Brazilian energy storage market.

1414 Degrees, an Australian startup manufacturing thermal energy storage systems using a proprietary silicon storage medium is preparing to launch an Initial Public Offering (IPO) and build a 200MWh ‘module’ at a renewable energy facility.

It’s been predicted for some time that the redox flow energy storage space will, after some turmoil and rapid consolidation, find success in providing energy storage at durations of more than four hours. This past couple of weeks have been a tale of both turmoil and success.

Cypress Creek Renewables, which developed 1GW of PV projects in an 18-month stretch up to the beginning of this year, has used Lockheed Martin’s lithium-ion battery storage solutions in a dozen just-completed solar-plus-storage projects.

ESS Inc, US manufacturer of a novel iron flow battery for stationary energy storage applications, has entered the German market via an agreement with investor, chemical company BASF.

A European consortium is to test the use of long duration storage flow machine technology with a large scale tidal energy project planned for the UK later this year.

News in brief from around the world of energy storage.

News in brief from around the world of energy storage.