One of Belgium’s largest battery energy storage system projects so far has been brought online at the site of a former coal power plant.

Neoen has begun construction of its 200MW/400MWh Western Downs Battery in Queensland, Australia.

France’s first high-voltage transmission grid-connected battery project colocated with a solar PV plant will be equipped with a battery energy storage system (BESS) from Saft.

Northern Powergrid, one of the six distribution network operators (DNOs) responsible for delivering power across regions of the UK, is to plough £1.9 million (US$2.53 million) into the creation of a smart energy grid across its network, allowing its eight million customers to trade power and services using their home solar, battery systems and electric vehicles (EVs).

Following an announcement earlier this month that Alfen will build the Czech Republic’s first large-scale battery energy storage system (BESS), the Dutch grid-scale system integrator has just completed a megawatt-scale project in Belgium.

The UK’s Electricity Storage Network advocates and educates for a better understanding of the issues surrounding various storage technologies, and how they can be among a number of resources to help balance the country’s energy networks. The ESN’s Dr Jill Cainey, a research scientist with a background in atmospheric science and climate change, was among attendees to a recent round table discussion hosted by the Energy Storage division of PV Tech Storage’s publisher, Solar Media.

A large-scale storage system co-located at a German solar farm by the PV plant’s developer Belectric, has been given the green light to operate in the grid-balancing frequency response market.