Energy storage

Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry is to subsidise the installation of distributed battery storage and energy-efficient technologies with a $779m incentive scheme.

The programme is aimed to encourage factories and small businesses to be more energy efficient. The incentive should also increase the installation of energy storage systems at PV power plants and grid substations. The deployment of the battery systems should strengthen electricity grids to facilitate growing levels of renewable energy sources.

The European Association for Storage of Energy (EASE) has named Klaus Peter Röttgen, head of E.ON Innovation Center Energy Storage, as new president of the organisation.

Röttgen had been vice president of EASE since 2011. He took over the presidential role from Bernard Delpech, director of shared services of EDF R&D. At E.ON, Röttgen focuses on pumped storage plants, electric storage, power-to-gas and thermal energy storage.

Daimler is to invest €100m ($125m) in its lithium-ion battery system manufacturing subsidiary Deutsche ACCUmotive over the next years.

The subsidiary will produce lithium-ion batteries for new electric versions of Daimler’s Smart cars in 2016 and new Mercedes Benz hybrid models. An expansion of the subsidiary’s manufacturing facility in Kamenz, Germany, is currently under construction and is set to be completed mid-2015, increasing the production space to 20,000 sq. m.

US startup Eos Energy Storage (Eos) has been commissioned by energy giant GDF Suez to supply a zinc-air battery energy storage system.

The 1MW/6MWh unit, marketed under the brand name Aurora, features a secondary zinc hybrid cathode battery system and is designed for the grid-scale energy storage market.

Renewable Energy Systems Americas (RES) has received a contract from Chicago utility Commonwealth Edison (ComEd) for two 19.8MW energy storage systems.

The battery storage sytems will be connected to the local ComEd electric grid to provide real-time frequency regulation service to the PJM ancillary services market. Each unit will store 7.8MWh.