Ontario’s Hydrogenics has won a contract to supply a hydrogen production, storage and fuel cell system to the German city of Herten, the Mississauga-based company announced today. Developing the means to manage intermittent electricity generation from wind power farms has been a key challenge for grid operators, one that Herten city officials decided was best Continue reading →
energy storage
The city of Rome, Italy is poised to welcome electric cars to its streets, according to Toshiba. The electronics giant announced this week that its Italian subsidiary Ansaldo Transmissione & Distribuzione S.p.A (Ansaldo T&D) won a contract to supply a smart grid distribution system to ACEA Distribuzione S.p.A (Gruppo ACEA), one of Italy’s leading public Continue reading →
A predicted boom in the use of smart grids is set to drive massive demand for lithium ion batteries. While the batteries are already present in many consumer electric devices, IHS reckons that lithium ion storage systems will become commonplace. via Smart grid boom swells Lithium ion demand 80 fold – Here be billions | Continue reading →
S&C Electric’s lithium-ion-based community energy storage system (CES) will be installed at customers’ homes in an AEP Ohio test project for the technology. The storage systems will provide CES-equipped customers up to several hours of backup power during outages. And eMeter, in collaboration with utility CPS Energy, announced that it has successfully integrated its EnergyIP® Continue reading →
Aquion Energy, Inc., a developer and manufacturer of revolutionary batteries and energy storage systems, today announced it has closed a $30 million round of venture financing. Foundation Capital led the round with participation from returning investor Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers as well as new investors Advanced Technology Ventures (ATV) and TriplePoint Capital. Coincident with Continue reading →
Powergetics has called itself an “intelligent energy storage system.” The firm just had its first close on a round A of $10.2 million from the The Angeleno Group and Greener Capital. (Here’s a link to the SEC document.) via Stealthy Powergetics Wins $10.2M in VC for Energy Storage : Greentech Media.
Wouldn’t it be great if the solution to integrating renewable energy technologies into the smart grid was as simple as a magic black box that had the ability to deliver 60-Hz AC power in a constant, perfect sine wave, no matter we put into it? That magic box looks like it might be real, and Continue reading →
The 2011 NAATBatt Annual Meeting and Conference concluded last Thursday in Louisville. The program was a great success. A wide range of speakers and panels touched on issues of great importance for the industry, including secondary use of EV batteries, distributed energy storage, battery recycling, new technologies in traction batteries and distributed energy storage systems, Continue reading →
Hi-tech battery supplier Saft will supply renewable energy storage for California’s very first micro-grid, distributed energy community housing project. Named 2500 R Street, the advanced houses will use state of the art technologies in smart grid, solar generation, and energy storage so that each and every house generates as significantly clean energy as it uses. Continue reading →
Large-scale batteries have an increasing role to play in smoothing out the integration of solar photovoltaic (PV) energy into power grids, according to battery-maker Saft. The company is displaying a number of its latest battery innovations at the European Photovoltaic Solar Energy Conference in Hamburg. via Large-scale batteries can boost solar’s role: Saft | Energy.
Solar thermal energy technologies are most prolific in use today –Decentralized power generation increases electric grid reliability and efficiency Demand for decentralized/distributed power generation technologies (DG) will overtake that of traditional power plants, according to a new report available on companiesandmarkets.com. Minimal energy loss during distribution and transmission, combined with improvements to the reliability of Continue reading →
Electrical energy storage at utility scale remains both the Holy Grail for electric industry redesign and one of the most vexing energy technology challenges. Storage applications may include: Peak shaving (load leveling) systems to help commercial and industrial users manage electricity costs under variable utility tariffs and to help utilities manage generating assets to minimize Continue reading →
Research and Markets has announced the addition of GlobalData’s new report “Energy Storage in Smart Grid – Technology Analysis, Benefits, Challenges and Applications” to their offering. GlobalData’s report “Energy Storage in Smart Grid – Technology Analysis, Benefits, Challenges and Applications” provides an analysis of the different technologies that help in the storage of energy in Continue reading →
Researchers at the University of Southampton have developed a mechanism which uses smart computerised agents to control energy storage devices in the home, resulting in energy savings of up to 16 per cent. In a paper entitled Decentralised Control of Micro-Storage in the Smart Grid, which will be delivered at the Twenty-Fifth Conference on Artificial Continue reading →
Green Charge Networks announced the launch of their new GreenStation product offering. GreenStation is an energy storage and management device operated directly by commercial facilities such as grocery and convenience stores, fast-food chains, hotels, parking garages and hotels. GreenStation locally stores energy during periods of low use and augments grid power with stored energy during Continue reading →
At the Intersolar conference held last week in San Francisco, energy storage was covered in a pre-conference session, as if storage were an optional topic solar companies could ponder, rather than something critical to the industry’s future. Could it be that most solar folks are still getting their minds around storage? via Energy Storage Critical Continue reading →
Carbon nanotubes can be used to store solar energy and be recharged by exposure to the sun, according to new research out of MIT. Associate professor Jeffrey Grossman and postdoc Alexie Kolpak created a new material using carbon nanotubes (very tiny tubular structures made of pure carbon) which can store the sun’s heat in chemical Continue reading →
If we want to implement renewable energy at a large scale, the grid needs to smarten up. Renewables like solar and wind are intermittent sources so they can’t provide the same energy security as gas fired power plants. On the one hand scientists are working on finding better methods to store electricity but on the Continue reading →
One of the reasons energy storage for the power grid isn’t widely used is that many of the technologies, like batteries, are still far too expensive to be used at grid scale. But what if you could use something that costs a fraction of a battery to deploy for grid storage … like Software-as-a-Service? On Continue reading →
There has been a fair bit of concern in recent years about the ability of our power plants to supply adequate electricity during periods of peak demand. Hydrostor, a Toronto-based company, is taking a different approach in offering a solution that allows plants to store their power using compressed air in underwater storage tanks. via Continue reading →
