Members of the public in South Australia are being given the chance to participate in creating the biggest ‘virtual power plant’ of solar PV and batteries the world has ever seen.
Japanese trading house Itochu has invested £5 million (US$7.04 million) into UK-based energy storage and related services provider Moixa, which will enable Itochu to add Moixa’s ‘GridShare’ aggregation platform to its own suite of battery storage solutions.
Stem Inc, self-described as a supplier of “artificial intelligence-powered” energy storage, which deployed a system on average every two days last year, has closed a US$80 million Series D financing round.
Well, we seem to say it at the end of every year, but 2017 seemed a lot busier than 2016, 2016 was busier and more exciting than the year before that, and so on! There have been some hints already on what the industry and its observers expect to see in 2018 and we do not doubt energy storage will continue in its rise to become a flexible cornerstone of the world’s electricity infrastructure. In the meantime, let’s reflect on the top news stories of last year, as reported by Energy-Storage.News and based on readership statistics from you:
A 250-home ‘virtual big battery’ was switched on in Canberra, Australia last week, allowing residents to sell solar-generated power at a significantly higher price than available to them through feed-in tariff (FiT) policies.
We often hear about California’s leading position in solar and latterly in energy storage. Perhaps lesser known than direct policy support for energy storage and renewable technologies is the way California’s network operator (CAISO) is starting to reconfigure how it procures demand response, with a positive impact for energy storage – and particularly behind-the-meter assets, as Ted Ko, policy director of Stem, explains.
In its home territory of Germany, energy storage provider Sonnen is making a play to replace utilities, but its business models in the US will instead emphasise cooperation with existing energy suppliers.
Energy storage services provider Peak Power will supply control platforms to 6MWh of energy storage projects in Ontario and New York, some of which will be funded by Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC).
