Johannes von Borries, managing partner of existing investor UVC Partners said: “STABL solves two important problems for the energy transition: first, the unique technology enables to build very efficient and cheap storage systems. Second, old batteries from cars are made reusable, thus extending their lifetime by many years in the spirit of the circular economy.”

The company describes its second-life BESS as a “simple and risk-free” solution for the commercial and industrial (C&I), real estate and agricultural sectors.

CEO Dr Nam Truong gave Energy-Storage.news more details on how the company sets itself apart from others in the second life space: “Our proprietary battery management system (BMS) is compatible with all battery modules with up to 18 cells in series. Our core-technology is the battery inverter that has the highest efficiency in the market and has the big advantage that we can use the full available capacity of every battery module, instead of being limited by the weakest battery module (which is always the case, when 750V battery packs are used).”

He added that the firm’s product ranges from €400-600 per kWh which is an “all-round carefree package without hidden costs” and that the average capacity over a 10-year lifetime will be at least 85%.

Energy-Storage.news then asked Truong what he saw as the main challenge for ESS companies in the coming years, to which he gave an interesting response.

“We do believe that just the matching of the batteries is not enough to ensure a long lifetime of the storage system. We think it is impossible to have such a precise matching of the batteries to avoid aging variations (because of different temperatures or marginal production variation) and therefore lose more capacity than needed,” he said.

“Second-life ESS companies will struggle with the deteriorating performance of their systems in the coming years (we heard that even 1st-life storage manufacturers have this problem with their older systems in the field).”

Truong then explained how Stabl’s proprietary technology would help it get around this: “Our inverter technology decouples the dependency of the battery modules and we can always access the full capacity of every battery module. In case a battery module needs to be swapped (because it is broken or lost too much capacity), this is a major deal for today’s architecture, where the storage system needs to be shut down for hours. STABL storage systems require a 10-minute break to easily swap the affected battery.”

It should be noted that other second life companies (such as California-based Element Energy) have also told Energy-Storage.news that their proprietary BMS also controls their BESS down to the module level. Another German second life firm, Voltfang, raised €5 million recently and said it “repurposes EV batteries at the module rather than pack level” although did not go as far as claiming that ability for its BMS’ control.

Some in the market have said that eventually, all commercial & industrial (C&I) use cases for energy storage could be served by second life BESS.

To this, Truong said: “We think a large share of the C&I segment could be served by second life. There will be applications that need high c-rates and we think that new high-power batteries are better suited for these applications.”

Energy-Storage.news looked at the second life market in depth for Vol.33 of PV Tech Power, Solar Media’s quarterly technical journal for the downstream solar and storage industry.

Dr Truong, second from left, with the rest of the Stabl team. Image: Stabl.

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According to new analysis by the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), since the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) passed one year ago, United States solar and storage companies have announced over $100 billion in private sector investments, helping bolster the American economy. Solar and storage manufacturing is now surging in the U.S., as 51 solar manufacturing facilities have been announced or expanded in the last year.

“The unprecedented surge in demand for American-made clean energy is a clear sign that the clean energy incentives enacted last year by Congress are working,” says Abigail Ross Hopper, SEIA president and CEO. “This law is a shining example of how good federal policy can help spur innovation and private investment in communities that need it most.” These new and expanded solar factories will invest nearly $20 billion into American communities and will amount to 155 GW of new production capacity across the solar supply chain.

These announcements include:

85 GW of solar module capacity

43 GW of solar cells

20 GW of silicon ingots and wafers 7 GW of inverter capacity

By 2026 the U.S. will have more than 17 times its current manufacturing capacity across modules, cells, wafers, ingots and inverters when these announced factories are in operation, which is enough to supply a majority of solar projects expected to be built in the U.S.

Over the next decade, the U.S. solar and storage industry will create 137,000 more jobs than it otherwise would have before the IRA was passed, with the entire industry workforce projected to grow to nearly 500,000 jobs by 2033.

Solar manufacturing facilities announced in the last year will employ more than 20,000 Americans. The nation’s solar manufacturing workforce is set to triple in size to over 100,000 jobs in the next decade.

In addition, 65 GWh of energy storage manufacturing capacity has been announced across 14 new or expanded facilities. Since the IRA was passed, over 3 GW of new large-scale energy storage projects have been deployed, and an estimated 100,000 customers have installed a residential solar system paired with battery storage. By 2033, U.S. solar capacity will reach 669 GW, enough to power every home east of the Mississippi River.

The solar industry will generate $565 billion in private sector investments over the next decade.

Image by Pixabay.

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A total of 93 projects were submitted into the auction, with 12 winners, 3 runner-ups and 78 projects which were excluded from the final list. Projects bid in with a desired annual aid amount, with a weighted average of the winning projects of €49,748 per MW per year.

This is less than half of the upper limit that projects could bid in at, of €115,000. When it emerged in July that companies were bidding in significantly below that figure, research and consultancy firm Clean Horizon told Energy-Storage.news it showed “players willing to take risks” to get into the Greek market.

The auction contains a clawback mechanism for if the projects generate significantly higher-than-predicted revenues.

See a table below detailing the 12 winning projects below, bid in by six different companies: Helleniq Renewables, PPC Renewables, Mytilineos, Intra – S Energy (Intrakat), Energy Technical Development SA and Energy Bank I I.K.E. It is not clear who the latter two’s ultimate parent companies (if any) are.

All of the projects appear to be two-hour duration.

Company submitting projectProject power rating (MW)Project guaranteed capacity (MWh)Offer (€k/MW/year)Helleniq Renewables5010033,948Helleniq Renewables255039,956PPC Renewables 5010047,291PPC Renewables 489648,756Intra – S Energy 5010049,501Helleniq Renewables255049,885Mytilineos489649,900Intra – S Energy 255055,332Energy Technical Development SA7.815.658,640Energy Technical Development SA816.5460,000Energy Bank I I.K.E49.9910060,887Intra – S Energy255964,112

The past year has seen gigawatts of projects receive electricity market licenses from the RAE, an integral, early part of the development process. PPC Renewables has the second-most energy storage licenses granted by the RAE according to Clean Horzion data from May, with EDP Renewables top of the list with around 1.5GW.

Mytilineos, an industrial conglomerate, said its winning project will be co-located with solar plants under construction and is expected to start construction in 2024 for a commercial operation date (COD) in 2025. It will be in Halkidiki, in the region of Central Macedonia.

The company plans to participate in future tenders from the RAE, it added, and will use its own aggregator unit to control the winning energy storage project.

Greece is aiming to have 3GW of energy storage online by 2030 to help it hit renewable energy targets, the this round of financial aid to projects is part of getting there.

The auction programme is partially funded by Greece’s portion of the EU-wide Recovery and Resilience Plan, the program to mitigate the negative economic effects of the Covid pandemic, a move which was approved in September last year.

See the RAE’s decision document (in Greek) here.

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Enverus, an energy-dedicated SaaS company, has acquired CRCL Solutions, a provider of cloud-based algorithms and modeling for wind and solar generation forecasts. CRCL Solutions provides a wide range of advanced forecasting data to help power traders make informed decisions and reduce trading risk.

“Accurate predictions of wind and solar production have become a necessary building block for everyone involved in the power industry,” says Jeff Hughes, CEO of Enverus. “To meet the needs of our customers we must forecast this production, and we must do it well.”

As renewable energy capacity continues to grow to meet the requirements of a changing U.S. energy market, power traders and plant operators are increasingly reliant upon accurate, granular wind and solar forecasting data to identify arbitrage opportunities, reduce trading risk and optimize asset deployments.

Thomas Sherman and Daniel Vassallo founded CRCL Solutions in 2021. Their recent work has spanned developing a novel algorithmic suite to improve weather forecasting, and creating a technological pipeline that transforms raw weather forecast data into wind and solar generation forecasts at the plant level.

“By combining CRCL’s core technology with Enverus’ data resources, CRCL can improve its current product offerings and create entirely new energy forecasting products that were previously not possible. We believe Enverus is a perfect partner to develop the next generation of wind and solar forecasting,” Sherman said.

Bernadette Johnson, general manager of Power and Renewables at Enverus, who will oversee CRCL Solution’s integration, adds: “CRCL Solutions’ offerings are complementary to what we’ve been building for years, and together, we will create more useful and granular forecasts that enhance solutions and diversification amid an ever-changing energy transition.”

Image by Lynn Greyling from Pixabay.

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SolarEdge Technologies Inc., a smart energy technology company, is unveiling the latest version of its SolarEdge Home Hub and Wave inverters in the U.S.

The new SolarEdge inverters will be integrated with power control system (PCS) technology, enabling the installation of PV systems that are more than 50% larger without requiring costly and time-consuming main panel upgrades (MPU).

With the new embedded PCS technology, the SolarEdge inverters can now monitor, balance and control the currents on the main panel busbar, resulting in the ability to install larger PV systems than allowed today by the National Electrical Code 120% rule. This means that a typical home with a 200 Amp main panel would be able to install up to three 11.4 kW SolarEdge inverters without going through a main panel upgrade.

Furthermore, the SolarEdge DC-coupled architecture enables up to 200% DC oversizing and storage of excess PV in the SolarEdge Home DC-coupled battery.

The PCS technology will be embedded in the new SolarEdge Home Hub and Wave inverters requiring only the current transformers to be installed on the main panel, with no additional external connector boxes, further simplifying installation and commissioning.

Other improvements in the inverter include software innovations for faster commissioning, and automotive-grade critical components for enhanced inverter reliability.

The new embedded PCS technology is expected to be available for order by the end of the year.

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FTC Solar Inc., a provider of solar tracker systems, software and engineering services, and Cat Creek Energy LLC, a renewable energy independent power producer, made a multi-year, 1-GW tracker supply agreement to supply the PV solar portion of CCE’s multi-technology renewable energy and water storage project, which is under development in southwest Idaho.

Beginning in the fall of 2023, FTC Solar will provide solar tracker equipment and services for the broader $1.5 billion new solar and battery infrastructure CCE will build to fulfill its recent agreement with Bayer, a global enterprise with core competencies in the life science fields of health care and nutrition. The long-term structured renewable energy credit purchase agreement between Bayer and Cat Creek Energy supplies 1,400 GWh of energy annually – one of the largest long-term corporate renewable energy agreements in the U.S.

Says Sean Hunkler, CEO of FTC Solar: “Our technology will support multiple Idaho solar and battery facilities that allow one of the world’s oldest and most respected companies to reduce its carbon footprint and continues the development of CCE’s centerpiece energy and water storage project.”

Tracker delivery in support of the projects is expected to begin in late 2023 and be completed by the end of 2025.

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Eric Lammers

Swift Current Energy has closed project financing for its 800 MW DC / 593 MW AC Double Black Diamond Solar project. Once operational, Double Black Diamond is expected to be the second largest single-phase solar project in the United States and the largest solar project in MISO, producing enough energy yearly to power the equivalent of more than 100,000 homes.

Located 30 miles west of Springfield, Ill., Double Black Diamond is currently being built and employs approximately 450 construction workers. Swift Current selected McCarthy Building Companies Inc. as the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) partner. The project utilizes First Solar modules, a majority of which are being manufactured in the U.S., as well as solar trackers from U.S.-based Nextracker.

Constellation will purchase a portion of the energy and RECs generated by Double Black Diamond Solar to serve several customers. The City of Chicago will source renewable energy produced by the project to power several energy-intensive facilities, including Chicago O’Hare International Airport and Midway International Airport. Additionally, Cook County Illinois, CVS Health, Loyola University of Chicago, PPG, State Farm and TransUnion have agreements to purchase power from the project via Constellation.

Double Black Diamond is scheduled to be energized in 2024. During its operational life, the project is expected to provide $100 million in tax revenue to Sangamon and Morgan counties in central Illinois, where it is located.

Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG), Societe Generale, and Truist served as the coordinating lead arrangers, with MUFG and Societe Generale acting as Joint Bookrunners, for the landmark project financing, which includes $695 million in construction and tax equity bridge loans and an $84 million letter of credit facility, making it one of the largest project financings ever for a U.S. solar project. ING acted as the Green Loan Structuring Agent and Wilmington Trust acted as the Collateral Agent and Depositary Agent.

Swift Current Energy, which is owned by BAES Infrastructure, IFM Net Zero Infrastructure Fund and Lookout Ridge Energy Partners, is the project developer and will be the long-term owner and operator.

Eric Lammers, CEO and co-founder of Swift Current, comments: “Double Black Diamond is a transformative project, not only for our team, but also the American workers it is employing, the massive amount of emissions-free energy it will produce and the stable revenue it will provide for the communities in Sangamon and Morgan Counties. We are pleased to work again with MUFG, Societe Generale, ING and Wilmington Trust and are excited to add Truist as a new partner.”

Vinson & Elkins LLP and Husch Blackwell LLP represented Swift Current in the transaction. Paul Hastings LLP advised MUFG, Societe Generale, Truist, and the other lenders party to the financing agreements.

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Last week, MGA Thermal said it raised AU$8.5 million (US$5.54 million) from assorted VC investors, while Shell is one of the existing backers of the company.

Both companies make storage systems based on blocks of composite material that can be heated to very high temperatures – the synthetic pellets made of recycled material in Kraftblock’s storage tech can be heated to over 1,300°C (2,500 °F) – which can retain heat for later use.

This could be particularly suited for helping decarbonise heavy industrial processes that require high temperature or high quality heat and are considered hard to abate emissions from – a report prepared by McKinsey for the Long Duration Energy Storage Council (LDES Council) highlighted that nearly half of global emissions come from heat and cooling processes.

They could also be useful for storing the excess output of power generation from renewable energy sources for time shifting to later use. Kraftblock claims its material can store heat for two weeks.

While the funds raised are relatively modest, the companies, and the wider sector, may well take comfort from the development, especially given the recent demise of fellow thermal storage startup Azelio.

Yesterday, Energy-Storage.news reported that Nostromo, another thermal energy storage startup, has been invited into term sheet negotiations with the US Department of Energy (DOE) Loan Programs Office (LPO) for a loan guarantee worth up to US$176 million.

However, Nostromo is focused on a different area of thermal storage: cooling for commercial buildings via replacing roof-mounted chillers in air conditioning units with a patented ‘IceBrick’. Meanwhile, Azelio has a fairly complex technology for time shifting renewables based on storing heat in a recycled steel alloy, and then outputting it via a Stirling engine to generate electricity.

Which speaks to the nascency of the thermal storage market: various very different technologies with different applications and specific target markets are frequently grouped together, making it difficult for investors and customers to judge a technology or provider’s potential.

Stacking up value proposition of thermal blocks

Kraftblock CFO and co-founder Susanne König said the company was proud to have closed its funding round “at a time when there are very limited funding opportunities for start-ups”.

The company is currently building a large-scale commercial and industrial (C&I) project with PepsiCo and utility company Eneco in the Netherlands.

Friers at a PepsiCo factory making potato chips will be switched to run on electricity and stored heat, instead of gas. After decarbonising the frying units, the plan is to decarbonise the rest of the factory step-by-step.

The Kraftblock storage system is 9MW output, with 70MWh energy storage capacity, with plans to expand to 150MWh. The system is due for completion in December this year, with Eneco to operate it.

The startup is targeting industries including food, paper, ceramics and steel production, with Shell Ventures investment director Jermaine Saaltink saying its technology could be “pivotal” in the decarbonisation of hard to abate industrial sectors, by “unlocking a renewable electrification pathway and the increased use of waste heat”.

CEO Dr Martin Schichtel said Kraftblock chose a cohort of investors with roots in industries the technology provider wanted to target.

MGA Thermal on the other hand is at a slightly earlier stage in its journey to commercialisation. The Australia company is currently building its first demonstration project, a 500kW/5MWh showcase of its Miscibility Gap Alloy (MGA) technology from which the company gets its name.

The project, helped with funding from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA), and Shell, will trial a variety of end-use applications, including providing dispatchable power, process heat and use in green hydrogen production.

Incidentally, both MGA Thermal and Kraftblock were shortlisted by ARENA in October last year for a 12-month feasibility study to replace fossil fuel generation at a power plant in South Australia.

Basically, the MGA Block the company makes contains two key materials: metal alloy particles that are dispersed into a matrix material. When the blocks are heated, the metal alloy particles melt and retain heat, kept in place by the matrix material. As the blocks cool with the system’s discharging, the particles become solid again.

Brenmiller Energy launches newest iteration of thermal tech

In somewhat related news, fellow thermal storage player Brenmiller Energy has just launched the latest iteration of its technology and signed an agreement with Indian solar power manufacturer Waaree.

Brenmiller has a solution, called bGen, which uses electricity from sources like wind and solar to heat up the storage material, in this case, rocks. They are heated to up to 750°C, and when discharging the heat can also create steam.

The company recently inaugurated what it claimed is the world’s first thermal storage gigafactory. From a site in Dimona, Israel, Brenmiller Energy will be making up to 4GWh of bGen modules annually.

Last year, as reported by Energy-Storage.news in November, Brenmiller and European utility Enel brought online a 24MWh thermal energy storage (TES) system in Tuscany, Italy, which will improve efficiency at a thermal power plant. The system reduces the generator’s start-up times and enables greater speed in handling variations in load.

This week, Brenmiller launched the new bGEN ZERO product, which it claimed has higher energy density and discharge power capability than its previous models, 99% charging efficiency and 97% power-to-heat cycle efficiency.

A few days prior, the company announced a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with PV module producer Waaree to potentially deploy its thermal storage in utility and industrial markets in India.

“In India, steam and other high-temperature processes for industrials are primarily powered by coal, accounting for roughly 25% of India’s carbon emissions. We are focused on helping large industrial corporations, including beverage, pharmaceutical, chemical, paper manufacturers, and more, to help them meet ambitious ESG goals,” Waaree chairman Hitech Doshi said.

This week, our colleagues at PV Tech reported that Waaree has just completed an equity fund raise worth around US$121 million, enabling it to add 6GW of annual ingot, wafer, cell and module production capacity to 12GW of existing lines.

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Scott Gubbles

GRNE Solar, a solar engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) firm, has transitioned to the Nelnet Renewable Energy brand. In 2022, the company was acquired by Nelnet Inc., a diversified financial services and technology concern.

Since 2012, GRNE Solar has installed commercial and residential solar energy solutions and utility-scale solar systems across 13 states. While GRNE Solar’s name and brand will no longer be used, its offerings remain unchanged.

In addition to offering expert residential, commercial and small utility-scale installation services and greenfield development, Nelnet Renewable Energy, as part of Nelnet Inc., is a leading solar tax equity investor. The organization offers a unique solar tax equity co-investment platform, a first-of-its-kind sustainability literacy platform for educational institutions and a venture capital investment team focused on supporting renewable energy innovation.

“This transition supports a focus on operational excellence by optimizing people, systems, processes and workflows to ensure we maximize value for all our stakeholders,” says Scott Gubbels, president Nelnet Renewable Energy. “This name reflects our company’s unwavering commitment to the solar industry.”

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First Solar Inc. has chosen the Acadiana Regional Airport in Iberia Parish, La., as the location for its previously announced fifth fully vertically integrated manufacturing facility in the United States. The facility, believed to be the single largest capital infusion in the area’s history, represents an investment of up to $1.1 billion in expanding America’s capacity to produce its own photovoltaic (PV) solar modules. Expected to be completed in the first half of 2026, the plant is forecast to grow the company’s nameplate manufacturing capacity by 3.5 GW to reach approximately 14 GW in the U.S. in 2026.

First Solar’s investment in Louisiana is expected to create over 700 new direct manufacturing jobs in the state. The company, already believed to be the largest employer in America’s solar manufacturing sector with more than 2,500 employees across the country, expects to have over 4,000 direct employees in the country by 2026.

“This massive investment and the jobs it will create are a huge win for the people of Acadiana and the entire state,” says Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards. “It is proof positive that Louisiana’s ‘all-of-the-above’ approach to energy is growing and diversifying our economy.”

First Solar is unique among the world’s ten largest solar manufacturers for being the only U.S.-headquartered company and not manufacturing in China. The company’s tellurium-based semiconductor, which allows it to avoid any dependence on Chinese crystalline silicon supply chains, is the second most common photovoltaic technology available today.

Says Mark Widmar, CEO, First Solar: “Louisiana’s ability to deliver the talent we need stood out, thanks to its extensive workforce development initiatives and the presence of academic institutions such as the University of Louisiana at Lafayette which now features a world-class solar energy lab.”

Widmar added, “In bringing our unique, fully vertically integrated solar manufacturing model to Louisiana, we expect the plant to mirror the commitment to Responsible Solar evident at every First Solar manufacturing facility, which are among the cleanest, safest, and most diverse in the industry”

Since the beginning of this decade, First Solar has embarked on a $4.1 billion manufacturing expansion strategy that has seen it grow from approximately 6 GW of global nameplate capacity in 2020 to 13 GW operational today.

The new Louisiana facility will produce First Solar’s Series 7 modules, which are expected to be manufactured with 100% U.S.-made components. First Solar anticipates that once the new factory is completed and ramped, Series 7 modules will account for over two thirds of its annual domestic nameplate capacity. Series 7 modules currently produced at the company’s Ohio facility are already manufactured with U.S.-made glass and steel.

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