The energy storage market is expanding quite rapidly, driven largely by the increasing availability of affordable energy from renewable sources. This process is just starting and according to some forecasts, the value of this market is expected to increase by a factor of 100 over the next 20 years. This presents a tremendous opportunity and motivates businesses to adopt this technology to start taking advantage of the changing energy landscape.

As you might expect from a company like EnviroTech, we are well aware of the growing importance of battery storage technologies and actively promote their use. In fact, our parent company Envirotech solutions are currently in the process of building the largest battery storage site in Europe.

From our extensive experience, we know that the following arguments will impact the narrative about the sustainable future of energy: 

Which benefits can battery storage provide?

Properly implemented battery storage can provide multiple benefits to end users, including both tactical and strategic ones.

Load balancing is possibly the most important since it serves to neutralise the variations of demand by storing energy during periods of low use and putting it back into the network once the demand spikes. Bridging power is another benefit that pertains to the ability of the network to seamlessly switch between two or more generation sources, without dangerous gaps. Finally, battery storage facilitates highly effective power quality management, which is very important because large fluctuations in power can damage sensitive equipment. Of course, battery storage is also useful in case of a power outage, allowing businesses to operate as normal. Finally, battery storage allows grid users to avoid expensive peak tariffs and instead use stored energy, thus saving money every month. Taken together, these factors make battery storage a key technology that will likely receive a lot of attention from business and private customers.

Which factors are increasing demand?

We are witnessing a significant change when it comes to energy usage, with awareness about the dangers of unsustainable expenditure sharply rising. This is motivating a faster adoption of sustainable energy technologies, some of which ideally require battery storage to be more feasible. For example, battery storage complements solar installations and enables them to provide power during the night or on a cloudy day.

Energy storage systems are ‘fuel neutral’ and can store electricity from traditional as well as ‘green’ sources, but they are undoubtedly benefiting from the increased focus on energy efficiency. Successful businesses frequently suffer damage from power outages, and even the largest companies may be vulnerable – in 2013, Google famously lost more than £100,000 per minute during a particularly bad power loss. In total, more than $130 billion is lost annually due to grid instability, and battery storage can prevent much of that damage. Smaller companies may not be liable for such large sums, but even a loss of £100-1000 feels unacceptable when it can be easily prevented with a user-friendly and inexpensive technological solution. For some companies like nursing homes or medical institutions, business continuity can mean much more than financial loss, since their role depends on the constant supply of electricity to potentially life-saving equipment.