G7 2018 Series – How can Energy Storage help Mitigate Climate Change

There is an energy transition under way, one as radical as the adoption of coal, oil and gas at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution.

Renewable energy is playing an increasingly important role in the world’s energy mix and as this role expands, the development of energy storage plants will be central to the future success of the planet’s energy network.

What is energy storage?

Energy storage is the capture of energy produced at one time for use at a later time. A device that stores energy is sometimes called an accumulator. Energy comes in multiple forms including radiation, chemical, gravitational potential, electrical potential, electricity, elevated temperature, latent heat and kinetic.

Energy storage involves converting energy from forms that are difficult to store to more conveniently or economically storable forms. Bulk energy storage is dominated by pumped hydro, which accounts for 99% of global energy storage.

What are the barriers to greater adoption?

Despite the many benefits of energy storage, there are numerous barriers inhibiting greater technology adoption, including information gaps about technology options, costs, safety, potential benefits, and market barriers; an absence of coordinated government policies and program to achieve cost reductions and encourage market uptake; and a lack of constancy across available incentives, financing options, and business models. In fact, the state of the energy storage market and policy landscape is comparable to where the solar industry was about ten years ago, and, while solar and storage are different technologies, the policy trajectory that helped the solar industry could also inform how to scale-up energy storage markets.