Australian real estate developer Mirvac looks set to put a sizeable amount of solar-plus-storage into brand new homes in Sydney and Brisbane, with help from the national Clean Energy Finance Corporation.

Speakers at Energy Storage Europe were confident, despite a few reservations, that Germany’s new government which grants Chancellor Angela Merkel a fourth term in office will be good for the environment and for renewable energy.

The UK’s first listed fund for energy storage is setting out to raise £100 million (~$139 million) for investment in battery projects, with a seed portfolio of an estimated 18MW/20MWh already arranged.

The economics of solar-and-storage in the UK are being proven, according to Anesco, the developer of one such project.

The European Investment Bank (EIB) has approved a loan request from Northvolt that will see the bank provide a financing facility of up to US$64.8 million to support Northvolt’s pilot demonstration facility.

London-headquartered oil and gas company BP has announced plans to invest US$500 million (£358.5 million) in low carbon businesses each year as it looks to further embrace the low carbon transition.

African Infrastructure Investment Managers (AIIM) has invested in Starsight Power Utility, a Nigeria-based energy services company providing solar-diesel-battery hybrid and efficient cooling and lighting solutions to its commercial and industrial clients.

We continue with the second part of our feature interview with clean energy entrepreneur and financier Jigar Shah of Generate Capital. We’ve just left off discussing the risk profile of various investors and how the industry is gradually drawing attention from more traditional sources of capital, from the early adopter-venture capital mentality we have seen to date.

SunEdison founder and solar financing pioneer Jigar Shah talked to Andy Colthorpe about having the ‘freedom to invest’ for the biggest impact and why, with traditional lenders still reluctant to finance energy storage, there will always be space for frontrunners who are able to properly understand the value propositions of new and innovative sustainable technologies.

VC funding for energy storage projects increased significantly, while debt and public market financing remained “steady” during 2017, Mercom Capital has found.