France-headquartered mega-utility EDF has accepted delivery and installation of a flywheel energy storage system manufactured by Germany’s Stornetic, at EDF’s “full testing playground” south of Paris.

Swiss utility and power distribution company EKZ (Elektrizitätswerke des Kantons Zürich) is building a grid-balancing and renewables integrating 18MW / 7.5MWh energy storage system and has appointed NEC Energy Solutions to execute the project.

A village in the south east of the Czech Republic will be host to what is thought to be the country’s first grid-scale lithium-ion battery energy storage system (BESS) connected to a solar farm.

The government of Jay Weatherill, premier of South Australia, has just formally launched three Calls for Proposals under the Renewable Technology Fund, a programme to foster private investment and accelerate project development in clean energy technologies.

Another utility-scale energy storage facility has got the green light for construction in South Australia, claimed to be the first in the country to be “backed by mostly private investment from the energy industry”.

California’s grid operations will be supported by the ramping of an estimated 3,000MW of energy storage, when a solar eclipse expected across the Pacific North-West of the US will cause PV generation to dip.

Developer Deepwater Wind has applied to build a 144MW offshore wind farm, coupled with 40MWh of battery-based energy storage from Tesla, off the coast of Massachusetts.

Earlier this week the UK government and energy regulator Ofgem published a strategy for a modernised, smart and flexible power system, the result of an eagerly anticipated response to last year’s Smart Power Call for Evidence. Liam Stoker takes a deep dive to examine the implications for solar and energy storage of this major undertaking.

A local government-owned utility in Australia’s Northern Territory is set to go ahead with a 5MW / 3.3MWh battery energy storage system (BESS) in the town of Alice Springs.

Market conditions are “artificially” restricting energy storage batteries from “leveraging and maximising their multiple capabilities” a US trade group which includes utilities, technology and service providers and grid operators among its membership has argued.