The vanadium flow battery sector received a boost this week with news of a rental partnership between Invinity and Dawsongroup plc, a new electrolyte plant in Germany and a whitepaper around the technology’s environmental impact.

UK-based Connected Energy has raised £15 million (US$18.4 million) from five new investors to help scale up its second life-based battery energy storage system (BESS) solution.

Details have emerged of the UK’s Smart Export Guarantee (SEG), which will see owners of small-scale solar facilities continue to be paid for surplus energy sent to the grid, aiming to close the policy gap left by the end of feed-in tariffs (FiTs), by the end of 2019.

UK energy regulator Ofgem has published guidance outlining how developers and asset owners can add storage to their subsidised solar installations without losing accreditation to the Renewables Obligation (RO) and Feed-in Tariff (FiT).

BYD has now officially launched its “B-BOX” in the UK – an energy storage system for household and commercial applications featuring the same battery technology used in buses running throughout central London.

The United Kingdom’s decision by referendum last week to exit the European Union has been received negatively by one of the few commentators prepared to go on record with a UK industry view.

In the second part of our video interview with Sonnen’s UK director, Martin Allman, we look into the future. We talk smart meters, community energy trading, which steps forward Britain is ready to take – and why the industry needs to walk before it can run.

Sonnen, Germany’s market leader in residential energy storage, recently launched its operations in Britain. We met up with Martin Allman, the company’s UK country director, to hear about key aspects of the company’s strategy.

UK solar developers WElink Energy and British Solar Renewables (BSR) have signed a £1.1 billion (US$1.6 billion) deal with China National Building Materials Group (CNBM) to develop solar energy projects and zero-carbon homes in the UK.

Since 2010, the cost of lithium-ion battery packs for electric vehicles has dropped 60%, from $1000 to $400 per kilowatt-hour (kWh) according to analysis by BNEF. At the same time, concerns regarding urban air pollution and our need to deploy zero emission vehicles in these cities are increasing. Melissa C. Lott takes a closer look at how EVs could help – and what the limitations might be.