The year in energy storage started off with a bang as Italian utility Enel acquired a 100 percent stake in U.S.-based Demand Energy, a developer and operator of energy storage systems and software, for an undisclosed amount.

Enel’s renewables division operates 36 gigawatts of clean energy around the world. The North America subsidiary, which will control Demand Energy, has more than 100 plants spanning hydropower, wind, geothermal and solar energy, with a managed capacity of more than 2.8 gigawatts. That global portfolio now has become a ready and willing customer for Demand Energy’s storage and energy management software, named DEN.OS, for Distributed Energy Network Optimization System.

“Through this transaction, we will be able to greatly strengthen our position in the growing battery storage market with a complementary partner and innovator,” said Francesco Venturini, Enel’s head of global renewable energies, in a statement. “By combining our global presence and expertise in systems integration with Demand Energy’s software and established product offering, we will expand the development of renewables and storage both in the U.S. and globally, delivering a clean, reliable, high-tech and cost-effective energy solution.”

That’s not a bad outcome for the 30-person American startup with just 3 megawatts and 9 megawatt-hours of installed storage capacity under its belt. The goal now is to quickly scale Demand Energy’s resources and capabilities, said President and CEO Gregg Patterson.

“As we were looking at our options, Enel clearly stood out,” he said. “They have a monstrous renewables portfolio worldwide and they really wanted a dependable and capable software platform. We were looking for the ideal partner to scale and grow behind the meter, in front of the meter and in microgrids.”

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FORT DEVENS — These days we plug in everything: phones, flashlights, cameras — sometimes even our cars. We keep recharging them because, with electricity, you either “use it or lose it” unless you store power in a battery.

“The electric grid is the only supply chain in the world where you need to generate electricity and consume it at the exact same time,” says Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources Commissioner Judith Judson.

By 2020, DOER is requiring electric utilities in the state to procure large-scale storage systems for some of the electricity they generate. Just how much is yet to be decided. What technology they use is up to them.

Now, a novel liquid battery is potentially offering unlimited storage capacity.

Power From A ‘Goddess’

If beauty is in the eye of the beholder, you can see it by the truckload parked behind an Army Reserve building at Fort Devens. Inside, two 53-foot-long shipping containers are huge tanks filled with vanadium — the element named after the Scandinavian goddess of beauty.

“The vanadium, the beautiful part about it is the liquid changes color,” says Vionx Energy CEO David Vieau. “It’s like a rainbow goes through as you charge it. It changes. We can actually tell charge state by the color of the liquid.”

Vieau’s Woburn-based company has been testing a novel kind of battery at Devens for the military that stores energy in liquid form.

“This was an early system that the Army wanted to do to begin to understand from a microgrid standpoint how could they get an independent energy capability,” Vieau explains. “Could you get something that would allow them to get separated from the grid?”

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It’s unclear what’s ahead for federal policy on microgrids and distributed energy with the changing of the guard in Washington, D.C. But the Obama administration pushed the resources in its final energy blueprint issued last week.

“Transforming the Nation’s Electricity System,” the second installment of the Department of Energy’s Quadrennial Energy Review looks at the rapid technology overhaul on the grid and the challenges that result.

The 500-page report sets out 76 recommendations covering a broad range of energy issues. Specific to microgrids and distributed energy, they include:

Expanding federal programs to demonstrate the integration and optimization of distribution-system technologies

Significantly increasing federal research, develop and demonstration of clean electricity

Increasing federal support to help states value and incorporate the resources into their energy plans

The report points out ways the federal government can help microgrids and distributed energy from a technical, market and regulatory position.

For example, it recommends that a federal advisory committee look at ways to harmonize retail and wholesale electric rates. Among other things the committee would explore state and federal roles in pricing and operation of distributed energy, energy storage, and microgrids.

The report also points out a lack of organized commodity markets for distributed energy. This may change over time, the report says, and points to New York’s Reforming the Energy Vision (REV) as a possible model.

The report also calls for leveraging existing DOE programs to provide technical assistance in development of microgrids, distribution management systems, communications and sensors, energy storage and cybersecurity.

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A new energy demand response start-up is preparing to launch within weeks which will use machine learning and artificial intelligence to manage a portfolio of storage assets and provide real-time energy reserves to the grid.

Upside Energy’s Virtual Energy Store aims to relieve stress on the grid by using predictive algorithms to manage a number of distributed storage resources to reduce reliance on the spinning reserve capacity provided by traditional power stations.

The energy start-up’s cloud service currently coordinates batteries and other devices at around 40 sites but has the potential to manage thousands more across a broad portfolio of technologies, including small batteries within uninterruptible power supplies (UPS), electric vehicles and solar PV.

The company signed a firm frequency response (FFR) bridging contract with the National Grid in November and is currently qualifying its assets before officially launching its commercial service by early March.

Upside will begin by providing initial service to large batteries at Sheffield and Manchester Universities before seeking to take advantage of National Grid’s decision to lower the minimum entry point for its main frequency response tendering market from 10MW to 1MW from April.

The company will seek to build its access to batteries and other smart devices, such as home storage, intelligent hot water tanks or businesses’ reserve power supplies, by offering a second revenue stream in the form of frequency response.

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Lithium mining and extraction companies have made several recent high profile moves to increase their production of the metal, which is used to make the batteries in many stationary energy storage systems and EVs.

This includes the acquisition of a lithium mining operation in Nevada, US, home of Tesla’s Gigafactory, by Toronto Venture Stock Exchange (TSX-V) -listed LiCo Energy Metals, which has also signalled its intent to acquire exploitation concessions for lithium in Chile. Meanwhile, US-headquartered Albemarle Corporation, which owns the only existing lithium mine in the US – also in Nevada – announced that it too is seeking a big win in Chile, striking a deal to increase its lithium production from an existing facility.

LiCo Energy Metals announced on Friday that it had brokered a deal, subject to stock exchange approval, with exploration company Nevada Energy Metals, for 199 placer claims in the Black Rock Desert of Nevada. LiCo would earn an undivided 70% interest, while paying a 3% net smelter return royalty to Nevada Energy Metals. LiCo will pay the exploration company the sum of US$170,000 and issue it with 1.5 million shares upon approval by TSX-V. Then in the first year of the deal it would give Nevada Energy Metals another 1.5 million shares and then the same amount again in the second year. Before the third year LiCo will pay out a US$1,250,000 work commitment as well as paying a cash finder’s fee of US$75,000.

The Black Rock site covers about 2,000 square kilometres. The area in question contains lithium values “well below those of producing lithium brines”, but do represent a “significant source of metal available for evaporative concentration,” LiCo said. 

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Energy storage is set to become a major revenue earner for Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) in 2017. Recent moves in Europe and Asia show the promise this holds for the company as the energy storage industry takes off worldwide. Some analysts are now starting to recognize this, most recently, Baird. It made Tesla a “top pick” based on what it believes to be an accelerating energy storage business. This caused Baird to give Tesla a price target of $338 (the current stock price is $226.99). Indeed, its stock price rose markedly on the back of an announcement about battery production at the Gigafactory. This is possibly the start of Tesla’s energy storage being a positive catalyst for its stock price.

My article in October laid out many of the reasons why energy storage was so promising for the company. Recent developments reinforce my thesis.

Tesla’s Advantage

Tesla’s vertical integration model means it is able to integrate up and down the supply chain and produce products like solar panels, racking, inverters and energy storage all in-house. The ability to integrate an inverter with storage gives Tesla many opportunities to entice customers. An inverter turns direct current energy from solar panels into the alternating current used by the grid and by home circuits. As Musk said at a recent earnings call, “solar and batteries go together like peanut butter and jelly.”

Both solar and battery prices continue to fall. Critics who say prices won’t fall further don’t back their argument with good reason. The electricity grid has not really changed since the days of Thomas Edison and, alternative energy and battery storage should completely change everything.

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Oregon has become the latest US state to lay out its foundations for electricity companies to procure and deploy energy storage systems, with the state Public Utility Commission (PUC) providing guidelines and timelines.

The state actually enacted bill HB2193, which would authorise utilities to explore the possibilities of deploying energy storage for reasons including deferring spending on transmission infrastructure, back in 2015. The latest document to emerge from the PUC gives details on how it sees that electric companies with over 25,000 retail customers could select storage system providers and present project proposals to the commission. Once approved, they have been given until 2020 to procure projects.

This would apply to two utilities, Pacificorp, trading as Pacific Power, and Portland General Electric Company (PGE). While the systems should have over 5MWh storage capacity each, they would also be capped at 1% of the utility’s peak load in 2014, except, the PUC said, for a project of “statewide significance”. Utilities will be allowed to recover the costs of projects from ratepayers.

GTM Research’s recent report on third quarter 2016 activity in energy storage in the US highlighted policy moves to spur on energy storage development in Oregon and in Massachusetts as two of the states following national leaders California and New York’s lead in recognising the value of energy storage. Massachusetts has determined that it will implement procurement targets for storage, although it has yet to rule on their size or timescale.

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