America's grid battery revolution.

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Published 2024-07-14
China is often held up as leading the way in renewable energy, but it's actually the USA that has most enthusiastically embraced battery energy storage to help stabilize the electricity grid, and in some surprising locations. But is it all about the noble effort of decarbonisation or are we seeing some market profiteering here?

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Research Links

Batteries vs Pumped Hydro
reneweconomy.com.au/battery-storage-is-about-to-ov…

Tierra Climate
www.tierraclimate.com/
static1.squarespace.com/static/63fbf45fc81e1561941…

Europe Grid Storage
www.energy-storage.news/europe-10gw-energy-storage…

ease-storage.eu/publication/emmes-8-0-march-2024/

EU Battery sourcing benefits
cleantechnica.com/2024/05/13/european-made-batteri…

Cushman and Wakefield - China battery energy storage
www.cushmanwakefield.com/en/greater-china/insights…

Australia battery energy storage
www.energy-storage.news/australia-installed-2-5gwh…

Bloomberg NEF
about.bnef.com/blog/lithium-ion-battery-pack-price…

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All Comments (21)
  • In Texas one big factor was the winter freeze of 2021. The governor blamed it on renewables not doing as advertised,when a report came out that most energy the state had during that time were renewables. The reason was gas lines broke cutting service to millions.
  • @Dumbo3.1428
    Thank you very much for your work sir. Politicians should have a listen
  • @chrisb508
    Regarding solar, wind and battery storage in Texas, it is 100% that installing it is profitable. It's probably the best indication that the transition is actually going to happen because policy here is not driven by what is best for the environment.
  • Very true! In addition to the lobbying issue, if oil subsidies were eliminated and the playing field was leveled, we wouldn't be having this discussion at all.
  • @jmckittrick1
    Glad to hear all this news. I didn't realize battery storage was going so well
  • Just a reminder to those in the US, until 2030 you can get a tax credit of 30% on home battery installations. The credit is non-refundable, i.e. you can only use it to reduce your tax, not get it in cash. You should also check to see if there are credits or low interest loans available at the state level or from your utility.
  • Well here's a daft idea:- Subsidised EV connection points at work places, shopping centres etc so that they can absorb the middle of the day glut of solar. If you have solar at home what you feed into the grid is deducted from what is put back into your car at work. Then when you drive home reconnect your vehicle to grid car and use it to reduce the peak load demand in the evening / over night. That way you are reducing the cost to the consumer and the number of batteries they need to buy. So daft it might just work.
  • @raybo946
    Didn’t notice you mention one of the great benefits of grid-level battery storage…quickly supplanting the need for peaker plants which could be dirty. Even if filled with non-renewable excess power, they may be filled from more efficient sources (ie. cleaner) avoiding inefficient peaker plants. Proud of the revolution in my Texas home!
  • @Dr.Gehrig
    This is great news. And will only get better as more LFP battery production expands, and then even more as the even cheaper Sodium ion batteries become more ubiquitous.
  • @oebydoeby
    Plug in batteries are now starting to get to market in Europe. you just plug in the battery into a standard socket, connect a app and you are done. Power in/output is limited to 800W with a capacity of 2.5kwh. But these things mean no planning permits, and electricians install etc. and ppl can backup their own solar really easy. Prices are close to a tipping point. So where home solar really took off first now these home batteries can be installed in a day. If all homes with solar would install such small battery it adds up to a massive capacity. And because it is local it reduces the stress on the grid.
  • @justsayen2024
    At the school district that I work A private company installed huge parking lot solar canopies and they've recently installed huge Tesla storage batteries to back up the grid.
  • In Australia, we're having a hamfisted go at a pumped hydro scheme, called Snowy 2.0, that is meant to have a 2GW capacity, for 16 hours. However, the tunnel boring machine for the headrace is stuck in some soft, then some hard rock, so we're now behind by 2 years, and overbudget maybe 4 x with it. This is throwing the whole idea of pumped hydro in Australia into doubt (mainly driven by the RW shock jocks and usual Murdoch & adjacent filth-spewers), even tho we have over 60,000 potential and feasible sites for projects, small and large. Even if only 20% of these were developed, by the time the big batteries we are installing have reached the end of their service lives, we'd have peak power storage for half a century or more.
  • @geirvinje2556
    Oil subsidies are at $US 9.000.000.000.000. (International Monetary Fund Numbers). So, instead of co2 pricing, why not remove the subsidies? This is more than $US 1.000 for every human on earth!
  • In Spain we have lots of molten salt storage, and much more could be installes. No need to import costly solutions.
  • We got rid of that gimmick of a PM in Australia, thank god, when the coal fired power station went out in Queensland the batteries in South Australia, 2000Klms away kept the lights on.
  • Fossil fuel subsidies have increased by 31% in 2023 -2024 in the sun drenched country of Australia. Tax free Profit for international oil & gas corporations are ongoing, while Indigenous Aboriginal communities are prevented from installing renewable power systems on their reclaimed Homelands ...
  • Storage is agnostic as to source. So as solar and wind is installed the arbitrage advantage will flip. That will accelerate the decline of fossil fuels as that happens. That is what California has shown and what some of the Texas plants are staring to show. Storage in near Urban areas are very susceptible consumer solar and associated VPPs so that part of the IRA will begin to play out more and more.