Powin is the fifth-largest battery energy storage system integrator in the world. Image: Powin.

Global battery energy storage system (BESS) integrator Powin has agreed to sell a minority stake to Samsung Venture Investment Corporation.

Samsung Venture Investment Corporation (SVIC) has agreed to buy a stake in Portland-headquartered Powin. A press release described SVIC as a fund managed on behalf of Samsung C&T (Engineering & Construction Group), the group’s engineering procurement and construction (EPC) firm, although elsewhere Samsung describes SVIC as the investment arm of the entire Samsung Group.

As part of the deal, Samsung C&T has designated Powin as a preferred storage provider and will bid for new projects with Powin as the BESS hardware and software provider.

The deal will help Powin to reach international markets where it has not completed projects yet, like the Middle East and Southeast Asia, while Samsung C&T, which is nearly 100 years old, has delivered projects in most major markets. For the South Korea-headquartered firm, the deal allows it to invest in the long-term growth of a BESS platform in line with its corporate objective to support the energy transition.

Samsung’s investment follows on from private equity firms Trilantic North America and Energy Impact Partners buying a controlling stake in Powin in February last year, as reported by Energy-Storage.news.

Powin CEO Geoff Brown said: “We are pleased to establish a strategic and forward-looking partnership with Samsung C&T as we accelerate our international growth. The long-term relationships that Samsung C&T has built with customers across the globe and their project execution experience and reputation will be instrumental as we enter new markets. We look forward to learning from Samsung C&T’s immense execution experience as we build the future of energy.”

Like most South Korean chaebol conglomerates, Samsung Group has a complicated ownership structure but what is certain is that C&T is an entirely distinct division from Samsung SDI, the company’s battery manufacturing business.

Samsung SDI has at least in the past owned shares in C&T, however, and in 2015 Reuters reported it would sell a 2.6% stake to comply with South Korea’s competition watchdog. The company has undergone a significant restructuring since then according to Korean media.

Energy-Storage.news has asked Powin to confirm that, as it appears, the deal does not involve Samsung SDI or affect Powin’s battery cell procurement approach. Just a few weeks ago the company announced an expansion of its battery cell and system testing lab in Oregon, which tests different vendors’ technology.

And in a recent interview with this site, Brown said that Powin worked with lots of different cell manufacturers and was keen to engage with new industry players and non-lithium technologies once they become competitive with lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries, its current chemistry of choice.

Samsung C&T is best-known for major skyscraper projects including the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, the world’s tallest, the Petronas Towers in Malaysia and the in-development Saudi Stock Exchange Tadawul Tower.

Commodities giant Trafigura invests in LDES startup Malta Inc

In a similar piece of news, commodities trader Trafigura has invested an undisclosed sum in long duration energy storage startup Malta Inc. The deal markets Trafigura’s eighth investment in emerging renewable and clean energy technologies.

Malta has developed a pumped heat energy storage (PHES) system that stores electricity as thermal energy with a discharge duration of up to 200 hours, it claims. It converts electricity into heat and stores it in molten salt then converts that heat back into electrical energy.

The company was founded in 2018 as a spinout of Alphabet’s Moonshot Factory, the Google parent company’s incubator for exploratory technology companies. It raised a US$50 million Series B in March last year and its technical advisor Michael Geyer was recently elected co-president of the Long Duration Energy Storage Alliance.

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A Li-Cycle worker handling battery packs. Image: Li-Cycle.

Lithium-ion battery recycling specialist Li-Cycle reported US$8.7 million in revenues for the quarter ended April 30, 2022, more than double the previous quarter.

Li-Cycle said the growth in revenues – 29x higher than the same quarter the previous year – was driven by increases in product sales volume and metal-based prices. Its operating expenses increased to US$30 million, six times higher than the US$5.6 million in the same period last year.

That resulted in a net loss of US$20.7 million, up 165% year-on-year. Adjusted EBITDA loss was US$19.5 million. Its financial year runs to October 31.

The company recycles lithium-ion batteries from both EVs and energy storage and its two-step process can achieve a 95% recovery rate. It recently opened its third recycling facility, in Arizona, its third ‘Spoke’ facility. Spoke facilities process battery scrap and end-of-life batteries before sending the resulting black mass to a recycling hub in New York, set to come online in 2023, which will refine it into the different critical materials which can then be used in lithium-ion battery production.

The company expects the energy storage system (ESS) sector to be a major contributor both for providing materials but also for offtaking recycled materials Li-Cycle produces.

During its most recent quarter, the company entered into long-term agreements with LG and Glencore to be their preferred lithium-ion battery recycling partner. The two companies will provide feedstock and scrap to Li-Cycle’s hubs while Glencore will provide black mass and sulfuric acid for its hub once open. Both LG and Glencore will have also signed offtake agreements for some of Li-Cycle’s battery-grade products produced at the Rochester hub.

“We continued to successfully implement our Spoke & Hub network strategy, with significant operational, commercial, and financial achievements this quarter,” Ajay Kochhar, Li-Cycle President and Chief Executive Officer.

“Strategically, we are positioning Li-Cycle as a leading and preferred recycler and supplier of critical battery materials, capitalizing on the significant secular growth trends.”

Li-Cycle, which went public on the New York Stock Exchange in August last year through a SPAC merger, finished its second quarter with US$509.3 million cash in hand. That rises to US$760 million on a pro-forma basis including the investments totalling US$250 million from LG and Glencore as part of those deals.

The company plans to open spoke facilities in Europe – Norway and Germany – in the first half of 2023, and by the end of that year anticipates having an annual recycling capacity of 65,000 tonnes. Based on figures previously provided to Energy-Storage.news by Kunal Phalpher, Li-Cycle CCO, that 65,00 tonnes equates to material from approximately 13GWh of batteries.

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Vanadium is used in the redox flow batteries of the type seen here, at a site in Oxford, UK. Image: Invinity Energy Systems.

Hitachi Energy has partnered with Nevada Vanadium, a company developing what could be the US’ first-ever primary vanadium source, to power the mine entirely from renewable energy.

Nevada Vanadium Mining Corp (Nevada Vanadium) is developing Gibellini, an open pit mine in the western US state’s Battle Mountain region.

The company anticipates the start of operations at the facility in 2024. A recently completed preliminary economic assessment (PEA) of the site demonstrated that an after-tax 25.4% internal rate of return (IRR) on investment could be achieved at an assumed average vanadium pentoxide price of US$10 per pound (0.45kg).

That would mean a payback period of two-and-a-half years on US$147 million capital expenditure required to get the mine started, according to the PEA which Nevada Vanadium commissioned consultancy Wood Group to produce.

Vanadium is used as an additive in steel for construction, which makes the steel much stronger with just a small amount of vanadium, reducing the weight, volume and therefore carbon footprint of steel used in that industry.

It also has industrial uses in defense, aerospace and other manufacturing sectors, as well of course as the electrolyte in vanadium redox flow batteries (VRFBs) for stationary energy storage. Although the stationary storage sector remains a marginal consumer, it is expected that will rise considerably in the coming years.

One recent report predicted that vanadium production worldwide could be doubled to meet demand for stationary energy storage applications by 2031. US Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm is known to be enthused on the prospects of flow batteries for grid storage.

In a 2020 presentation, Nevada Vanadium VP for environment and sustainability said that the Gibellini mine could be capable of producing 10 million pounds of vanadium annually, which would be equivalent to about 50% of US demand today – all of which is met by imports at present, Ron Espell said.   

At present, there are only three vanadium producers from primary resources in the world, Largo Resources, which mines vanadium in Brazil, Bushveld Minerals in South Africa and Glencore, also in South Africa. Both Largo and Bushveld are becoming involved in the flow battery space, establishing subsidiaries focused on energy storage.

However, these producers only account for about 15% to 25% of vanadium used by industry, with the vast majority coming from secondary producers in Brazil and China, where vanadium is extracted as a byproduct of steel manufacturing.

Other primary vanadium resources are being developed elsewhere, notably in Australia, where the vanadium flow battery was invented.

Back in 2014, this site interviewed the CEO of American Vanadium, a now-defunct company which was developing a vanadium mine in Nevada from which it wanted to base its own flow battery production.

Nevada Vanadium mine will be 100% renewable powered

Nevada Vanadium said today that Hitachi Energy has been selected to develop renewable energy supply for Gibellini that will enable the facility to be self-sufficient and reliable around the clock.

Hitachi Energy will consult with the mining company on the requirements for the site, which Nevada Vanadium believes could be powered with a microgrid running on solar and equipped with battery energy storage system (BESS) technology, which can also provide back up to ensure continuity of operations.

Hitachi Energy, formerly known as Hitachi ABB Power Grids, has its own battery storage solution range and digital energy management and controls platforms, as well as other related technology and services in its portfolio.

The tech company will work with M3, the contractor designing the mine itself, and look at the operating profile and power consumption of mines, equipment demands under normal, emergency and transient operations, interconnection to the grid from the site and the possibilities of extending the power supply’s scope to also delivering energy to local communities.

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Another Leeward Energy project, Barilla Solar project in Pecos County, Texas

Leeward Renewable Energy (LRE) has begun construction of the 200 MW Horizon Solar project near the city of Pearsall in Frio County, Texas. The project is expected to reach commercial operation by the fourth quarter of 2023.

“We are pleased to begin construction at our Horizon Solar project,” says Omar Aboudaher, LRE’s vice president of development. “Today marks another important milestone in the development of the 200-MW Texas solar facility, bringing LRE one step closer to providing clean, renewable energy. We thank the community and officials of Frio County for their support and look forward to a long-term partnership.”

“The Horizon Solar project represents meaningful progress for Frio County,” states Hon. Arnulfo C. Luna, a Frio County judge. “The economic impact to our County and schools will make a real difference to our community. We’re proud and excited to welcome Horizon Solar to our community.”

LRE previously announced four 15-year renewable energy purchase agreements with Verizon Communications Inc. through which Verizon will purchase the energy generated at Horizon Solar, in addition to energy generated by three other LRE projects. Horizon Solar will also provide reliable, renewable energy, and offset the equivalent emissions of more than 40,000 average Texas households. The project will include solar components from American-based companies, including solar modules from First Solar and smart solar tracker solutions from NexTracker.

“At Verizon, we are committed to reducing our impact on the planet through proven sustainable and socially responsible strategies and programs,” comments James Gowen, Verizon’s chief sustainability officer and senior vice president of global supply chain. “The latest development in our work with LRE helps build a greener U.S. energy grid, and the Horizon Solar project facility is another key component on our way to achieving net zero emissions in our direct operations by 2035.”

Once completed later next year, Horizon Solar will be LRE’s second operational solar project in Texas where the company is currently operating the 30 MW Barilla Solar project. In total, LRE will have over 1,200 MW of contracted solar projects in operation by end of 2023 and has approximately 16 GW of solar projects in development and construction.

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KORE Power’s 12GWh KOREPlex facility in Arizona will open next year. Image: KORE Power.

Battery cell manufacturer KORE Power is to provide the batteries for a 10MW/20MWh battery storage project under development between ABB and green energy supplier Ecotricity in the UK.

The battery energy storage system (BESS) will be installed at Ecotricity’s existing 6.9MW wind farm in Gloucestershire, England, in 2023, with KORE to supply its Mark 1 energy storage modules equipped with its high energy density NMC pouch technology. The Mark 1 system is fully certified under UN 38.3, UL 1973 and IEC 62619 and achieved UL 9540A.

KORE said the project represents a key step for the company in the “rapidly growing UK market”. KORE itself is headquartered in the US, where it’s currently building a battery cell gigafactory with a 12GWh annual production capacity. Located in Arizona, the gigafactory will add to a ramp up of KORE’s existing factory in China from 2GWh to 6GWh.

The company also recently launched a full service storage integrator division – KORE Solutions – with the acquisition of existing provider Northern Reliability.

ABB’s eStorage MAX BESS in Gloucestershire is to be integrated with Ecotricity’s Smart Grid platform, using the company’s proprietary optimisation model to dispatch the battery energy storage according to system needs.

The project is to provide both a material addition to the company’s renewable energy offering and also highlight the potential of short-term fast response technologies such as BESS to add additional stability to the national grid, KORE said.

“We share the vision of ABB and Ecotricity that renewable, reliable energy is the smart choice for business and for the planet,” said Lindsay Gorrill, co-founder and CEO of KORE Power. “This project demonstrates that our clean energy future has arrived.”

This story first appeared on Solar Power Portal.

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Slate solar-plus-storage project in California came online in Q1, contributing 561MWh to the record-breaking first quarter grid-scale tally. Image: Goldman Sachs Renewable Power.

The US energy storage industry is going strong, but delays due to supply chain issues, interconnection queue waiting times and other factors have led Wood Mackenzie Power & Renewables to downwardly revise its deployment forecasts for the year.

The industry has just enjoyed its strongest opening quarter of the year on record in terms of megawatt-hours of grid-scale energy storage, with 2,339MWh deployed in Q1 2022, the research firm said in its latest ‘US Energy Storage Monitor’ report.

However, this was achieved despite procurement challenges and delays to projects, which Wood Mackenzie and others have warned about previously, and the firm said the grid-scale market could even be considered on hold in the short term.

Across all market segments, including grid-scale, residential and non-residential (such as commercial and industrial or community installations), the US deployed 955MW/2,875MWh during the first three months of the year.

That represents a significant quarter-on-quarter decrease from Q4 2021’s 1,613MW/4,727MWh recorded in the Monitor, albeit installations are typically backloaded to the latter half of the year. Even then, Wood Mackenzie noted that a further 2GW of grid-scale storage expected to come online during that quarter had been pushed back to 2022 and 2023 completion dates.

For Q1 2022, the same applied to 1.2GW of grid-scale storage, although the firm anticipated that three-quarters of that capacity could still be installed during this year. Main causes of delays were transportation, supply chain and interconnection queue related.

Transportation logistics continue to remain disrupted in the wake of COVID and latterly due to the Russian-Ukraine war, something affecting many different industries around the world and not just energy storage.

Supply chain issues however, largely as a function of lithium-ion’s popularity for electric vehicles (EVs) causing materials prices to rise and supply to be constrained, are more specific to the industry. These have been forecast to last roughly another three to five years as battery manufacturing and – more importantly – raw materials supply comes online.

That is affecting energy storage markets outside the US too. Yesterday, Energy-Storage.news reported that research into the European energy storage market forecast a plateauing of the installation growth trajectory across the continent between 2024 and 2027, driven largely by lithium supply chain issues causing delays to projects.

Interconnection queues for access to the electric grid persist in presenting a challenge for all types of energy resources that connect to it, including solar, wind and batteries, though efforts are being made to improve the situation and reduce delays.

‘Predictability restored’ as solar AD/CVD tariffs waived

Another factor that has cause trepidation among developers and investors is the solar PV anti-dumping and countervailing duties (AD/CVD) tariffs imposed on imported PV modules from Southeast Asia.

Put in place in the wake of allegations Chinese manufacturers were manufacturing or assembling products in Southeast Asian countries to get around import rules, the duties had caused a downturn in activity in hybrid resource project development for projects pairing solar with storage.

President Biden’s recent move to pause the tariffs until 2024 does mean however that activity is likely to again pick up.

“The Biden Administration’s recent decision to pause AD/CVD solar tariffs for two years restores predictability to both the solar and energy storage markets. With well over 50% of utility storage projects being paired with solar farms, this important executive action will help the energy storage market continue to accelerate,” John Hensley, VP of the American Clean Power Association (ACP), which partners Wood Mackenzie Power & Renewables on the US Energy Storage Monitor, said.

While that shadow over the industry has lifted, the AD/CVD impacts on the opening part of the year mean a dampening of forecasted expectations, according to the report.

The first quarter’s record-breaking grid-scale deployments were largely concentrated in leading states Texas, Nevada and California. Wood Mackenzie analyst Vanessa Witte noted that the West Coast and Southwest regions of the US dominate the grid-scale segment for both standalone and hybrid storage.

Meanwhile, at residential scale, the market was impacted by “challenging” supply conditions, but continued to grow, with a record 145MW/334MWh deployed in the quarter. This was driven partly by energy storage becoming a “go-to backup power solution” in Puerto Rico and Texas, the second and third biggest residential markets after long-established leader California.

“Despite challenging supply conditions continuing to suppress residential storage, the segment saw over 20,000 installations in a single quarter for the first time and we’re seeing large and small installers forge new vendor partnerships to help meet rising customer demand,” Wood Mackenzie analyst Chloe Holden said.

Non-residential continued to be the segment with the smallest market share, with around 63MW/142MWh installed around the US in Q1 2022. Two-thirds of that megawatt figure (41MW) was delivered in New York by projects eligible for the state’s Value of Distributed Energy Resources (VDER) incentive scheme, many of which are solar-plus-storage projects. The research group noted that non-residential has also been impacted to date by AD/CVD.

Both non-residential and residential are predicted to grow in the near future: Wood Mackenzie predicts residential will become a 2.1GW/5.7GWh annual market in the US by 2026, and non-residential a 1GW annual market in that time.

Overall Wood Mackenzie is forecasting 54.9GW/188.4GWh of cumulative installations across all three market segments between 2022 and 2026.

Last year, the firm had forecast about 12GWh of US deployments, finding later that the total was closer to 10.5GWh, including 9.2GWh of grid-scale.

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A lithium ion battery cathode up close. Image: Argonne National Laboratory/Nancy Dietz-Rago

Mining giant Rio Tinto has invested US$10 million in battery materials company Nano One, a few weeks after Nano One acquired the lithium iron phosphate cathode business of Johnson Matthey.

Rio Tinto’s investment, which amounts to 4.9% of Nano One’ stock, is part of a broader strategic collaboration between the two companies. Nano One produces lithium-ion battery cathode materials including nickel-manganese-cobalt (NMC), lithium iron phosphate (LFP) and manganese-rich (LNMO) chemistries.

Nano One said the partnership will accelerate the commercialisation of its One-Pot manufacturing technology, which it says produces no sulphate waste stream, and M2CAM (metal direct to cathode) material which uses less water and energy than conventional methods.

The company said its technology can be used to make batteries of all lithium-ion chemistries for electric vehicles (EVs), energy storage systems (ESS) and portable electronics.

The collaboration includes a study of Rio Tinto’s products including iron powders from a facility in Québec as feedstock for the production of Nano One’s cathode materials, as well as the former’s know-how from its Critical Minerals and Technology Centre, a research centre.

The Centre has expertise in the extraction and processing of critical minerals such as lithium and scandium, as well as minerals from Canada, the United States, and other international sources to further drive localidation of the lithium-ion battery value chain, the company said.

On closing of this deal, Nano One will issue a total of 4,643,148 common shares to Rio Tinto at C$2.70 per share, with the investment proceeds going to several specific things alongside general technology and supply chain development, commercialisation and general working capital.

One of these is Nano One’s agreement to acquire 100% of the shares of Johnson Matthey Battery Materials Ltd, a subsidiary of the speciality chemicals and sustainable technologies company based in London, for US$7.9 million. That deal was announced at the end of May 2022.

The main asset Nano One gets is a facility in Quebec which can produce 2,400 tonnes of LFP cathode material a year for the lithium-ion battery sector. Johnson Matthey acquired the facility in 2015, three years after it was launched. It will now be converted to Nano One’s One-Pot LFP process.

Some of Rio Tinto’s investment will also go towards industrial scale piloting of other Nano One cathode active material (CAM) technologies.

Dan Blondal, CEO of Nano One, said: “The global transition to a low-carbon electrified economy will require millions of tonnes of battery materials, so it is critically important to produce these materials efficiently and with the lowest environmental footprint.”

Marnie Finlayson, managing director of Rio Tinto’s Battery Materials portfolio, added: “Localised, clean and secure supply chains are critical for the success of the energy transition that is now underway and this requires partnerships with innovative companies like Nano One to help us differentiate, disrupt and accelerate the path to a net-zero future.”

In related news, Rio Tinto has launched a tender for 4GW of onshore renewables to power three aluminium production and processing assets in Australia, sister site PV Tech reported this week.

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Sembcorp BESS project in the UK, equipped with containerised BESS units supplied by Fluence. Image: Sembcorp.

Singapore-based energy and urban development group Sembcorp is building 200MWh of battery storage systems on Jurong Island, home to much of the country’s industrial activity.

Jurong Island was formed through land reclamation efforts that began in the late 1960s and culminated in its establishment as one of the world’s top 10 chemicals production hubs and top five refinery export hubs.

With work underway to transform it into a Sustainable Energy and Chemicals Park by 2030 as part of the government’s Green Economy policy, the amount of renewable energy generated and used on the island is increasing.

The Singapore Energy Markets Authority (EMA) issued an expression of interest (EOI) in May to build 200MW/200MWh of battery storage, which resulted in the award to Sembcorp.

Sembcorp said in a statement yesterday that it expects to complete work on the battery energy storage system (BESS) deployment by the end of this year. Energy-Storage.news has contacted the company for more details on the project and its award.

Sembcorp was one of EMA’s collaborators on a programme to accelerate the deployment of energy storage in Singapore, which began in late 2018 and received the authority’s support to build the country’s first distributed virtual power plant (VPP). EMA had already identified the ability of energy storage to help integrate renewable energy and enhance the overall reliability of the energy supply and grid.

The country’s first large-scale battery storage system was connected to the grid in 2020, a 2.4MWh system from Wartsila.

Although since then there have only been a handful of distributed energy storage systems and small pilot projects installed, EMA’s preparatory efforts have included commissioning for publication an energy storage technology roadmap, a handbook of regulatory requirements to install energy storage and a guide for consumers.

In the May EOI, EMA was soliciting energy storage system (ESS) capacity that could serve different functions over two phases of its expected lifetime.

For up to the first two years of the project the ESS would provide “200MW/200MWh of spinning reserves to free up Combined Cycle Gas Turbines for generating purposes”. For the remaining lifetime, it would be “mainly used to provide frequency regulation to mitigate solar intermittency and ensure grid reliability during solar hours”.

Bidders would build, own and operate the energy storage capacity and EMA set a deadline for November this year for projects to come online. Proposals were limited to systems using lithium-ion or vanadium redox flow battery storage.

EMA had a target in place to deploy 200MW of storage by 2025. Although this single award will take it beyond that, the authority noted that it anticipates more will be needed to enable the national target of 2GWp of solar PV by 2030.

Sembcorp’s energy storage business activities have to date been mostly focused in the UK market, with 150MW in construction or already in operation in that market, while the company announced in December 2021 plans to build a 360MW project in northeast England which would be the biggest in Britain to date.

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The latest U.S. Energy Storage Monitor report from Wood Mackenzie, a Verisk business, and the American Clean Power Association (ACP) shows the U.S. energy storage market set a new record in the first quarter of 2022, with grid-scale installations totaling 2,399 MWh, the highest capacity for Q1 on record. The volume of U.S. grid-scale installations was four times the volume seen in Q1 of last year, despite continued procurement difficulties and project delays.

“Quarter one of 2022 was the largest first quarter on record by far for grid-scale installations, a notable milestone since installations are typically back-weighted to the second half of the year,” says Vanessa Witte, senior analyst with Wood Mackenzie’s energy storage team. “The West Coast and Southwest regions continue to dominate for both standalone and hybrid systems.”

Despite significant growth, near-term risks remain for the grid-scale market. Market disruption from the anti-dumping and countervailing duties (AD/CVD) solar tariff investigation initiated by the Department of Commerce in March lowered projections for hybrid projects significantly in 2022, and to a lesser extent in 2023, as procurement stalled.

“The Biden Administration’s recent decision to pause AD/CVD solar tariffs for two years restores predictability to both the solar and energy storage markets,” states John Hensley, vice president of research and analytics at ACP. “With well over 50% of utility storage projects being paired with solar farms, this important executive action will help the energy storage market continue to accelerate.”

Residential storage also had its strongest quarter to date with 334 MWh installed in Q1, beating the previous quarterly record of 283 MWh in Q4 of last year.

“Despite challenging supply conditions continuing to suppress residential storage, the segment saw over 20,000 installations in a single quarter for the first time and we’re seeing large and small installers forge new vendor partnerships to help meet rising customer demand,” comments Chloe Holden, analyst with Wood Mackenzie.

By 2026, the residential storage segment is forecasted to grow by 5.7 GWh annually, with California’s Net Energy Metering (NEM) 3.0 expected to align with the California Public Utilities Commission’s December 2021 proposed decision with implementation now on a delayed timeline.

Non-residential storage is predicted to grow 1 GW annually by 2026, but the overall market forecast has been downgraded due in part to AD/CVD-related procurement delays. “A meaningful share of residential solar-plus-storage projects not yet procured are being pushed to 2023, which has impacted paired storage,” Holden adds.

Overall, the U.S. energy storage market added 955 MW and 2,875 MWh across all segments in the first quarter of 2022.

“California continues to dominate the sector, with the Valley Center and Slate projects taking the top two spots for largest projects installed in Q1,” Witte concludes. “We also saw more than 90 MW of storage come online outside the top seven states, including projects in Oregon and Alaska.”

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Sean Gallagher

The Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) has released a whitepaper detailing the extensive interconnection reforms needed to rapidly decarbonize the electricity grid. Across the country, state and federal leaders are doubling down on their clean energy goals, but distribution utilities and regional transmission organizations (RTO) are struggling to keep up with overflowing interconnection queues.

The new whitepaper, Lessons from the Front Line: Principles and Recommendations for Large-scale and Distributed Energy Interconnection Reforms, discusses the various opportunities utilities and regulators have to standardize, automate and clarify interconnection procedures and policies.

“If we don’t make major strides on interconnection reforms in the next few years, it will be impossible to achieve our more aggressive state and national clean energy goals,” states Sean Gallagher, vice president of state and regulatory affairs at SEIA. “Improving project interconnection must become an urgent priority for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, distribution utilities and state commissions if we want to build an equitable clean energy economy this decade.”

The key to avoiding interconnection logjams is providing companies with more information about transmission and distribution grid operations. The policies must also build in accountability and consequences for utility inaction. New cost-sharing models for transmission and distribution system upgrades will make it easier to connect projects to the grid and reduce overall project costs.

Creating a central database for interconnection upgrade costs will help project developers make more informed decisions when considering an interconnection application submission. Better transparency will clarify utility overhead costs and create downward pricing pressure on monopolistic utilities that do not currently have any incentives or requirements to disclose pricing information.

“Transparency is the most important part of interconnection reform,” says David Gahl, executive director of the Solar and Storage Industries Institute (SI2) and SEIA’s former senior director of state policy, East. “Companies are left in the dark when it comes to grid planning and how much infrastructure upgrades might cost, increasing the likelihood that interconnection applications will be withdrawn. This whitepaper lays out the many ways lawmakers and regulators can eliminate this guessing game and put us on a path to reaching the president’s climate goals.”

Utilities and RTOs should standardize queue management processes and focus on hiring more staff members with dedicated expertise, the whitepaper says. Web-based portals that enable online application submissions and rapid information exchanges will also help to streamline the interconnection process. In addition, utilities and RTOs should automate as much of the processes as possible to reduce delays and speed the time it takes to process and study applications.

In the long term, the whitepaper says regulators should consider more systemic changes for RTOs and utilities like flexible interconnection agreements. These agreements, already in place in Europe, can be used to connect the resource to the grid without major infrastructure costs.

SEIA’s regulatory affairs experts have been engaging with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) on its transmission and interconnection dockets, and recently submitted recommendations to FERC’s Joint Federal-State Task Force on Electric Transmission. FERC is expected to publish a proposed rule that will cover many of the same topics raised in this whitepaper.

Read the whitepaper here.

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