california

The first stage of California Public Utilities Commission’s (CPUC) flagship energy storage target will be fully procured, according to the Commissioner responsible for its implementation.

In October 2013 CPUC approved a mandate requiring the state’s three large investor-owned utilities – Southern California Edison, Pacific Gas & Electric and San Diego Gas & Electric - to procure 1.325GW of energy storage by 2020. CPUC will issue in December its first competitive solicitation for the scheme, and with 136MW up for grabs demand is expected to be strong.

California-based commercial and industrial energy storage provider Stem has secured up to $100m working capital to finance its 'no upfront cost' installations. 

The $100m funding is being provided through affiliates of B Asset Manager, an investment adviser based in New York City.

Princeton Power Systems has celebrated the two-year operation of its commercial scale microgrid system on Alcatraz Island in the San Francisco Bay, US.

The New Jersey energy storage company installed 400kW of solar panels on the roof of the former San Francisco prison on the island and integrated the PV system with a 400kW lead-acid battery bank, two diesel generators, controllers and inverters. The system meets 60% of the island’s electricity demand.

Los Angeles-based CALEB Technology (CALEB) and California Lithium Battery (CalBattery) have teamed up to build next-gen lithium-ion batteries.

The joint venture (JV) is set to produce a line of “ultra-high” performance lithium-ion batteries for consumer electronics, power tools and electric vehicles (EV).

Energy storage startup Stem is to supply its distributed energy storage devices to the California independent system operator (ISO) market.

Stem combines behind-the-meter energy storage and real-time data analytics for commercial and industrial business. The pilot project between California ISO and Stem provides to bring various distributed storage systems together as one resource and feed it into a demand response system. With aggregating these power resources, the company will be able to dispatch power to the Californian grid in situations of high demand, without impacting customers’ operations, according to Stem.