More than 128,000 MW of energy storage are currently attached to the power grid worldwide, and more will be needed if renewable energy sources are to be integrated into the modern electrical grid, according to a recent report from ABI Research.
The company forecasts that utility-scale energy storage worldwide will increase to nearly 150 GW by 2015, growing at a compound annual growth rate of 2.6% through the 2010-2015 forecast period.
‘Over the next five years, multiple government-funded demonstration projects worldwide will help advance a number of energy-storage technologies by validating their ability to optimize power,’ says Larry Fisher, research director at ABI Research. ‘These include lithium-ion batteries, molten salt thermal energy storage and lead-carbon batteries. Further, as energy-storage costs decline with increasing production of these technologies – particularly with batteries – costs will be more in line with current sources of energy production, which will boost their acceptance by the utility community.’
‘Over the coming decade, as countries across the globe strive to meet their renewable energy targets, they will come to understand the need for energy-oriented storage,’ Fisher adds. ‘However, while such storage will serve to keep power costs low in the long run, each such implementation requires hundreds of millions of dollars to install and test, which will create a near-term rise in end-user electrical rates.’
SOURCE: ABI Research
