Another global solar giant to launch battery storage product in Australia

The nascent but highly prospective residential battery storage market in Australia has drawn another major international player, with Chinese solar giant GCL Poly to make a global launch of its battery storage product in Melbourne early next month.

GCL Poly, which has become the biggest player in the supply of poly-silicon and wafers to the solar PV market, and which is also a major developer of solar farms, will launch its new product at the Energy Storage Conference in early May.solar_storage_battery_620x448_310_224

The company recently purchased a majority share in WA-based solar panel wholesaler One Stop Warehouse, paying $US7.3 million for a 51 per cent stake as part of a push into new markets.

It is joining the likes of US companies Tesla and Enphase, German’s Soonnenbatterie and local firms Redflow and Ecoult to launch their first or their new generation battery storage products in Australia, which is expected to be the first mass-market for residential storage products in the world.

GCL subsidiary GCL System Integration Technology, its specialist in the solar and battery storage market, is targeting growth in Australia’s solar market as part of a major push to expand overseas.

Australia is part of our “strategic planning abroad,” said company president Shu Hua Shu told Bloomberg in an interview in Beijing last month. The company has cited anti-dumping regulations in the US and Europe for its pursuit of new markets, which also includes India.

GCL System increased its solar sales five fold in 2015, reaching more than 2.5 gigawatts in 2015 compared with an output of 500MW in 2014.

Its purchase of One Stop Warehouse is also part of its plan to establish its own distributed PV integration unit and to push into the energy storage market. Hence the formal launch of its product in Australia, where high electricity prices and the rate of solar installations is making it the most attractive market.

Comments

4 responses to “Another global solar giant to launch battery storage product in Australia”

  1. Mark Roest Avatar
    Mark Roest

    There has to be a way to tie these. developments into the fight in Alice Springs. For example, get a big company to finance the battery storage needed over time, as more solar is introduced, so people can afford it. Also fund the modeling and the control systems, operating at a smart microgrid scale, needed to prepare to sell electricity back and forth between neighborhoods in the same section of town, or between sections, and use the modeling to make the case that this provides the greatest good for the greatest number.

    1. Brendan Lee Avatar
      Brendan Lee

      See Reposit Power, Sunverge, etc. Multiple providers of this type of service. It just remains for the utilities to understand what these services mean for them (lower maintenance, less upgrades) rather than just issuing a blanket ‘nope’ for any future solar…

  2. Webber Depor Avatar
    Webber Depor

    Chinese battery. It doesn’t sound good

    1. david H Avatar

      I think we will have to get used to it just as we have with most other things we buy in Aus.

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