With a surprise general election coming in June for Britain’s ballot-weary voters, Ian Larive of Low Carbon looks at the possibility of political flux interrupting the industry’s momentum – and why whichever party is victorious, they should back energy storage.

Flow battery maker Primus Power was leader of the charts in VC funding in the first quarter of 2017, securing US$32 million from a range of investors, according to Mercom Capital’s latest report.

San Diego, California’s ultracapacitor-based energy storage manufacturer Maxwell Technologies has signed a stock purchase agreement with China’s SFIC Fund Management – a significant investor in China’s storage industry – at US$6.32 per share.

Japanese utility/grid operator Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) has invested half a million pounds (US$624,000) into UK residential energy storage system provider Moixa.

A Swiss fund aimed at encouraging institutional investors to get on board with energy storage has reached its first closing at €66 million (US$70.4 million).

Foresight Group, one of the top five asset owners in UK solar, is expecting to close its first battery storage acquisition in the coming weeks as it looks to complement its existing infrastructure portfolio.

A “first-of-its-kind” project financing deal will bring 50MW of Tesla Powerpacks online in California, Macquarie Capital, the investing and advisory arm of global finance corporation Macquarie Group has said.

The government of Victoria in Australia plans to invest AU$20 million (US$15.2 million) in large-scale energy storage initiatives across the state to reach 100MW by the end of 2018.

Last year was a “seminal year” for energy storage, where the technology moved from “dream to reality”, according to impact investor Nancy Pfund, one of the earliest backers to Tesla and SolarCity.

Financial services giant Morgan Stanley has anticipated that the US energy storage market will grow faster than current consensus expectations, while Deloitte has earmarked the technology for exponential growth – although not perhaps this year.