Energy storage market set to ‘explode’

Energy storage is often heralded as the “holy grail” of the energy market. It seems that a number of researchers and companies have worked hard and long enough that this holy grail is ready to see the light. According to market research firm IHS, the energy storage market is set to “explode” to an annual installation size of 6 gigawatts (GW) in 2017 and over 40 GW by 2022 — from an initial base of only 0.34 GW installed in 2012 and 2013.

The IHS report pits the US as the largest market for grid-connected energy storage installations through 2017. It projects that the US will install 43% of the capacity additions from 2012–2017. Germany and Japan are projected to be other top markets, as any regular reader, long-time of CleanTechnica would surely assume.

What will rule the day in the energy storage market in the coming few years? Zinc-air batteries? Zinc-iron redox flow batteries? Liquid-metal batteries? Not according to IHS. IHS projects that 64% of energy storage installations will come from lithium-ion batteries. That’s more or less what a recent panel of battery experts told me in Abu Dhabi as well — a story for a coming day.

In the longer term, it’s much harder to predict what will rule the day, or how much growth we’ll see. But, for now, I’ll let Sam Wilkinson, solar research manager at IHS, have the last word:

“The grid-connected energy storage market is set to explode, reaching a total of over 40 GW of installations by 2022.”

This article was originally published on CleanTechnica. Reproduced with permission. Read more at http://cleantechnica.com/2014/01/31/energy-storage-market-set-explode/#AlVAgRkI2giOyIPW.99