Increasingly, solar energy and behind-the-meter battery storage assets are being deployed on an ‘as-a-service’ basis and system integrator Younicos has decided to replicate the strategy for microgrids.

Energy-Storage.News caught up with Vish Iyer, global head of business development, strategy and marketing for the Hybrid and Energy Storage division at EPC firm Sterling and Wilson, to find out more about the company’s latest venture.

India-based EPC firm Sterling and Wilson has forayed into hybrid power plants and energy storage solutions and is already in advanced discussions for its first such projects in Africa and Europe.

Indian power minister R.K. Singh has chaired a meeting with battery-based energy storage manufacturers calling on them to set up manufacturing units in India.

Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI) has reached out to industry to establish how much interest there is in providing EPC services for a 160MW solar-wind hybrid project coupled with energy stroage in the state of Andhra Pradesh.

Major oil company Shell and European utility ENGIE are among investors to have pumped US$20 million into Husk Power Systems, a developer of microgrids which is expanding its efforts in Asia and Africa.

Submissions for Thailand’s first 300MW hybrid PPA scheme, which encourages use of energy storage to supplement renewable energy generation, are due by 20 October.

GE and utility Southern California Edison (SCE) unveiled the world’s first battery-gas turbine hybrid system this week in Norwalk, California.

French hybrid energy storage solutions provider Electro Power Systems has secured an equity-linked financing deal to the sum of €30 million (US$31.88 million) with the European Investment Bank (EIB).

Utility and network needs are rapidly changing and some are adopting both batteries and ultracapacitors to meet these needs. David Lentsch of Maxwell Technologies looks at some of the various approaches.