Tesla will acquire Maxwell Technologies, it was announced this week, although it is not clear yet which of Maxwell’s product lines, including ultracapacitors, are of most interest to the Silicon Valley automaker and new energy company.
LG Chem, IBM and Ford Motor Company have joined an effort to increase the transparency of supply chains for cobalt used in batteries – referred to by some as the ‘Blood Diamond’ of the energy and tech sectors.
Acquisition feeds into the inverter and smart energy company’s overall ‘masterplan’ to involve itself in the full gamut of distributed and clean energy market segments.
Ben Hill is widely known in the solar and energy storage industries as the former Trina Solar executive who drove the Chinese company towards a leading position in the European market in the days of the large-scale boom before leaving to become Tesla’s VP for Europe, Africa and the Middle East. UK start-up Solo Energy is among a number of companies he is now working with closely as an advisor.
An agreement to buy 75% of Korean battery manufacturer Kokam gives SolarEdge a level of vertical integration that could make the PV company a ‘one-stop-shop’ for customers, while SolarEdge could diversify into areas outside solar energy.
Battery manufacturing represents a “huge economic opportunity for India”, according to a draft ‘National energy storage mission’ (NESM) document, which outlines how the country could capture value across the supply chain and accelerate the country’s adoption of renewable energy.
Despite the growing interest and deployment figures for lithium-ion batteries for stationary energy storage, its ‘predecessor’ lead acid still has a strong role to play in enabling more and more people to go solar, a representative of Trojan Battery has argued.
A veteran of Kenya’s renewable energy industry has argued strongly in favour of lead acid batteries over lithium-ion, in response to a recent Energy-Storage.news article on off-grid solar PV in Africa.
