Battery storage

French renewable energy developer Neoen plans to develop a massive battery storage system near the Australian city of Geelong that will dwarf its largest project to date, the 100MW/129MWh Tesla big battery in South Australia.

Wood Mackenzie has cut its 2020 storage outlook to 430 MW – still an increase of more than 100% over 2019 – amid concerns over the role of sales, commissioning and interconnection in a period of shelter-in-place ordinances.

The International Renewable Energy Agency has devised a valuation framework to lay the foundations for successful storage deployment. As the technology matures and moves toward a projected fall in price, revenue stacking will be crucial to assess viability and properly value its benefits.

Market intelligence firm BloombergNEF has published a report with power company Statkraft and clean energy distributor Eaton highlighting the importance of sector coupling for Europe’s decarbonization plans. Analysts examined the power markets of Germany and the U.K. and concluded effective sector coupling including the use of green hydrogen could lead to greenhouse gas emission reductions of 83% by 2050.

As the sector continues to grow rapidly, delays in manufacturing scale-ups, difficulties sourcing raw materials and a separate path taken by the electric vehicle sector could all chuck ‘sand in the gears’, according to analyst Wood Mackenzie.

The luxury car maker is betting on the timely development of market-ready solid-state batteries. Mercedes will work with the Canadian research institute to quickly integrate new technology into field applications to cut development cycle times.

Irish energy-management specialist Eaton and Enico, a Finnish provider of modular storage systems, have agreed to jointly launch xStorage Container, an easily deployable storage solution that minimizes the internal footprint of buildings. The new offering was specifically designed for commercial and industrial self-consumption power projects.

The Abu Dhabi Fund for Development will support half a dozen megawatt scale projects featuring solar in the Caribbean and Africa. In addition to around 42.5 MW of new solar capacity, the fund will also back the development of energy storage, waste-to-energy and biogas facilities.

Storage has long been expected to be the handmaiden of a renewable energy world and its long awaited advances started to finally emerge in the third quarter as researchers posited R&D achievements ranging from potentially potent tungsten disulfide nanotubes to the business case for 10-year solar panels.

With almost a decade having passed since electric vehicles hit public roads, the price of battery packs has dropped 87% since 2010, according to a report by Bloomberg New Energy Finance. With rising efficiency and evolving supply chains, the market research group suggests cumulative demand will bring prices down to parity with internal combustion engine vehicles by 2024.