The UK energy storage sector is forging ahead after a landmark year in 2019 which saw maturing business models further the asset class’ role in the country’s energy system.

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.

While energy storage system (ESS) batteries are often described as stationary storage to distinguish them from batteries used in automotive applications, a new partnership in Europe turns containerised ESS into mobile power sources.

Wärtsilä Corporation has announced 126MWh of energy storage across two project deals in the past week in two far-apart regions of the world.

A regulatory framework put in place by Italy’s grid operator TERNA has enabled Enel X to aggregate residential energy storage systems to pool their capabilities.

Storelectric CTO Mark Howitt puts forward the case for his company’s ‘innovative’ adiabatic compressed air energy storage, which he claims is a long duration technology complementary to other existing and advanced tech such as batteries.

Italy’s electric system operator, Terna, approved contracts for dozens of megawatts (MWs) of energy storage facilities to serve grid-balancing applications each month throughout 2019.

Statkraft is laying claim to the first utility-scale battery in the Republic of Ireland with the completion of an 11MW project.

Commercial energy storage ‘pioneer’ Stem Inc and NEC have announced a master supply agreement and wide-ranging partnership that will see the latter’s equipment and solutions used in solar-plus-storage projects in Stem’s pipeline.