Solar power now accounts for around 1% of the world’s electricity generation, up from a negligible amount of solar capacity only a decade ago. But that’s just scratching the surface of the industry’s potential. Solar energy is the most abundant form of energy on earth, with enough solar energy hitting the planet’s surface every hour to provide for all of humanity’s energy needs for a year.

If the Energy Transition Outlook 2018 report from DNV GL, a quality-assurance and risk-management company, are true, solar electricity production could grow 65-fold by 2050, eventually making solar one of the largest sources of energy in the world. That presents a tremendous opportunity for long-term investors.

Why 6,500% growth is within reach

One of the reasons solar energy could grow 6,500% between 2016 and 2050, the period this report is analyzing, is because solar energy is growing from a fairly small base. According to DNV GL, only 290 gigawatts (GW) of solar was installed at the end of 2016, and about 100 GW are now being built per year. By 2050, DNV GL expects 18,895 GW to be installed by 2050.

Solar and wind power together are projected to provide two-thirds of all electricity in 2050. Incredibly, this is expected to come at a cost saving, with energy expenditures as a percentage of GDP falling from 5.5% in 2016 to 3.1% in 2050. Wind and solar will actually save money for consumers as they grow.

Who is installing all of this solar energy? 

Thirty percent of that 18,895 GW of solar energy capacity is projected to be installed on rooftops around the world. That presents a potential growth opportunity for a global rooftop solar leader like SunPower Corporation (NASDAQ:SPWR), which makes high-efficiency solar panels that pay more power generation on each roof. Since customers are willing to pay a premium for efficiency, SunPower can even charge more than commodity solar panel prices for its products, and that will help its economics as the industry grows.

What’s left is 70% of the solar market, which will be installed in large and small ground-mounted systems known as utility-scale solar projects. This is where First Solar (NASDAQ:FSLR) thrives as a solar panel provider, and Canadian Solar (NASDAQ:CSIQ) and JinkoSolar (NYSE:JKS)make solar panels and build their own projects.

Israel-based smart energy and inverter company SolarEdge announced on Thursday its intention to acquire battery manufacturer Kokam in a deal expected to be worth approximately $88 million.

SolarEdge announced that it would acquire approximately 75% of outstanding equity shares in Kokam for approximately $88 million, and would seek to acquire the remainder of the shares in the near future. SolarEdge expects the deal to be approved and closed in the coming weeks, and will look to purchase the remaining outstanding equity shares currently listed on the Korean over-the-counter exchange through open market purchases and otherwise, resulting in Kokam becoming a wholly-owned subsidiary of SolarEdge.

“The acquisition of Kokam will enable us to grow our offering, adding already proven battery storage to our product portfolio,” said Guy Sella, CEO, Chairman and Founder of SolarEdge. “Our technological innovation combined with Kokam’s world-class team and renowned battery storage solutions, will enable seamless integration with our current solutions, taking us a further step toward making solar installations smarter and more beneficial.”

Headquartered in South Korea and founded in 1989, Kokam manufactures Lithium-ion battery cells, batteries, and energy storage solutions and provides battery solutions for a wide variety of industries including energy storage systems, uninterruptible power supply systems, electric vehicles, aerospace, marine, and more.

Kokam currently boasts over 700 megawatt-hours (MWh) worth of energy storage deployments and over 60 battery-related patents.

“Residential solar and storage systems are becoming cheaper and therefore more popular, and this acquisition aims to bring a better product to this market,” explained Jane Swarbreck, a solar analyst at Bloomberg New Energy Finance. “Inverters are the link between solar and storage and so by acquiring battery manufacturer Kokam, SolarEdge is diversifying to offer their customers a more integrated and seamless solution for small-scale solar and storage projects.

“Integrated products, such as those offered by Tesla, are favored by customers looking for a one-stop shop for their home energy system. There is a central system that manages their solar and storage with a single software interface and point of contact with the manufacturer. For the customer, this probably means simpler installation and a more reliable warranty.”

A community energy project based on the south-west coast of Western Australia is offering households an opportunity to become 90 per cent renewable “for the price of a coffee a day” as part of a privately funded, potentially 6.5MW virtual power plant.

The Dunsborough Community Energy Project – which claims to be the first of its kind in WA, and Australia’s first VPP to be completely privately funded – is a collaboration between Perth-based company Redback Energy, investment outfit SUSI Partners and Perth law firm Jackson Macdonald.

The group’s first major goal is to pool the resources of 1000 or more Redback solar and battery storage systems installed across Dunsborough and the neighbouring town of Yallingup, and connect them using Australian made aggregation and control software.

The hook for local households and small businesses is zero upfront cost for the technology, which would include just under 7kW of solar PV (Suntech panels), one Redback 5.5 KVA inverter, 9.6kWh of Pylontech (LiFePo4) batteries, installation included.

The lithium ride was a great one. Cobalt, too. All they needed was their Elon Musk moment, which came in the form of the Nevada battery gigafactory. The next Elon Musk moment won’t be about lithium at all—or even cobalt. It will be for an element that takes everything electric to its revolutionary finish line: Vanadium.

The one moment that will change everything … and that moment may be near.

Vanadium is lithium on steroids—wildly bigger and the only way forward from here. We may have already reached the peak of our electric revolution through batteries with lithium.

We need bigger batteries, preferably the size of a football field—or 20.

That’s vanadium—Element 23. The answer to our issue of scale.

“It’s no longer a technological maybe,” says Matt Rhoades, president and CEO of United Battery Metals, a Colorado vanadium explorer sitting on one of the few known sources of the next big battery metal in the entire United States.

Rhoades should know … his company is behind the discovery that hopes to put America definitively on the vanadium map. UBM’s Wray Mesa Project in Colorado has a mineral resource base estimate indicating resource of around 2.7 million pounds of vanadium—not to mention all the uranium they already know is there for additional upside.

“Vanadium is here, and lithium is scared because the $13-billion energy storage market has already found its new poster boy,” Rhoades told Oilprice.com.

The Moment of Truth

Indeed, Rhoades is an expert at timing.

The worldwide battle for vanadium is ramping up …

The Chinese have already had their Elon Musk moment …

The U.S. has none …

And vanadium was the best-performing battery metal last year, beating out even lithium and cobalt.

UK energy storage and smart home specialist Moixa has this week unveiled a new ‘family-sized’ battery designed to help households take advantage of the growing number of time-of-use energy tariffs.

The company, which offers a range of smart home technologies designed to integrate energy storage and on-site renewables, said the new 4.8kWh ‘smart battery’ would help turn homes into ‘mini power stations’ capable of maximising revenue from the power they generate.

It said automated management of the battery would help customers slash energy costs and generate revenue by allowing customers to take advantage of new tariffs that reward people for powering their home or charging their electric vehicle when electricity demand is at its lowest.

Simon Daniel, CEO of Moixa, said the technology was designed to address a fast-growing market. “The next decade will see growing numbers of UK homes become mini power stations, generating and storing electricity, buying it when it is cheap and selling it back to the grid to support a cost-effective, low-carbon energy system,” he predicted. “We want to help customers take part in the smart power revolution and share its rewards. Our smart batteries know when it makes sense to buy energy and when to export it. They will soon know whether it’s better to charge your car battery or use it to power your home.”

The company said the new battery was its largest yet, providing significantly more storage than its existing 2kWh and 3kWh models. As such it is aimed at large families and big homes, or couples in smaller houses who are at home throughout the day.

“Solar and storage together can cut energy bills by up to 60 per cent,” the company added.

The battery is part of a wider push by the company to develop new smart home functionality. It is already involved in a number of trials to deploy solar arrays and storage units on a street-by-street basis to strengthen local grids and it confirmed this week it is also working on a new tool that will recommend the best energy tariff to customers based on their consumption patterns and their solar production.

In addition, the company has introduced AI-based software into its energy management systems that learn electric vehicle drivers’ patterns of use in order to help ensure the car is charged and ready when it is needed and optimise the use of solar power generated onsite.

Schneider Electric has won a $5.2 million contract to provide a microgrid for the nation’s second busiest port, the Port of Long Beach in the city of Long Beach, California.

One of the giants in the microgrid arena, Schneider will design, engineer and build the $7.1 million project. Part of the funding — $5 million – comes from a California Energy Commission grant.

Microgrids provide a way for ports to minimize use of diesel generators, their common form of power backup. Ports are seeking cleaner options as they pursue new energy and environmental goals. For example, the Port of Long Beach — which calls itself ‘The Green Port’ — is working to become a zero-emission operation.

“Ensuring a stable supply of energy is crucial to the zero-emissions future the Harbor Commission envisions for the Port of Long Beach,” said Tracy Egoscue, president of the Long Beach Board of Harbor Commissioners.

Because of their ability to island, microgrids offer a way for ports to secure electricity supply even if a power outage occurs on the central grid. Reliable electricity is crucial to major ports given the volume of business they do. The 3,200-acre Port of Long Beach handles $194 billion in cargo per year. It has 140 shipping lines with connections to 217 seaports.

The microgrid will bolster energy resilience for the port’s critical response facility, the Joint Command and Control Center (JCCC), which functions as the port’s hub for security.

“Across all industries and public entities, there is increasing demand to bolster energy resilience to support business continuity at critical facilities. The plans of the Port of Long Beach illustrate the foresight required to augment ongoing electrification efforts with resilience,” said Mark Feasel, vice president, smart grid & microgrid, Schneider Electric.

As part of the project, Schneider will help compile and analyze 12 months of performance data to ensure the microgrid moves the port towards its energy resilience goals.

Duke Energy’s advancement of battery energy storage technologies in the Carolinas includes $500 million of projects in the company’s 15-year forecast – continuing the company’s industry-leading deployment of the technology.

“Duke Energy is at the forefront of battery energy storage, and our investment could increase as we identify projects that deliver benefits to our customers,” said Rob Caldwell, president, Duke Energy Renewables and Distributed Energy Technology. “Utility-owned and operated projects in North Carolina and South Carolina will include a variety of system benefits that will help improve reliability for our customers and provide significant energy grid support for the region.”

In the company’s recent Integrated Resource Plan (IRP), Duke Energy outlined plans to deploy $500 million in battery storage projects in the Carolinas over the next 15 years – equal to about 300 MW of capacity. Combining battery storage from all utilities, North Carolina has only about 15 MW of battery storage capacity in operation, and far less in South Carolina.

As the grid operator, Duke Energy can maximize the versatility of storage beyond storing and dispatching of energy to include other customer and system benefits such as system balancing and deferral of traditional grid upgrades.

This week, the company filed for a Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity with the North Carolina Utilities Commission for a solar facility in the Hot Springs community of Madison County as part of a microgrid project.

The Hot Springs Microgrid project will consist of a 2-MWac solar facility and a 4-MW lithium-based battery storage facility. The microgrid will provide a safe, cost-effective and reliable grid solution for serving the Hot Springs area, and provide energy and grid support to all customers. The project will defer ongoing maintenance of an existing distribution power line that serves the remote town.

As renewable penetration grows, the need for energy storage grows as well. However, existing storage technologies may not be able to meet that need.

A Department of Energy (DOE) grant program aims to address that problem by trading efficiency for low cost.

Existing storage technologies fall short in terms of duration. Lithium-ion batteries, which have captured about 90% of the energy storage market, can economically run for about four hours. Pumped hydro storage, which accounts for the most energy storage today in terms of capacity, can generate power by releasing water from storage reservoirs for up to 20 hours under certain conditions.

But as renewable energy penetration reaches and surpasses 50%, the need for even longer durations will grow.

The sunny forecast for storage demand

The need for longer durations is particularly applicable to areas where solar power dominates the resource mix.

In a future where 70% of power is generated by solar panels, it is easy to imagine a scenario where a couple of cloudy days in a row could create a gap in meeting customer demand, Michael Jacobs, senior energy analyst at the Union of Concerned Scientists, told Utility Dive.

Filling that gap is the aim of a program at the DOE that is providing funding for technologies that can extend energy storage durations to up to 100 hours.

Last month, the DOE’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) awarded just over $28 million to 10 projects that aim to push the limits of energy storage duration. ARPA-E’s Duration Addition to electricitY Storage (DAYS) program aims to push the duration of energy storage systems out to 100 hours.

One hundred hours, just a little more than four days, is an exponential leap from current durations but the role of ARPA-E is to focus on early stage technologies that are not yet commercial or quite ready for the private sector.

CPS Energy recently broke ground on their first solar energy and battery storage project in Texas.

The greater San Antonio’s natural gas and electric provider says the project is a culmination of three years of work, which included a partnership with Southwest Research Institute (SwRI). For theirpart, SwRI is providing nearly 50 acres of land on which the solar facility and battery storage system will be constructed. SwRI aims to gain insight into the efficiencies of both solar production and battery energy storage. Sharing that information with CPS Energy will provide the utility with vital information that someday may lead to similar projects on a larger scale as they continue to execute their “Flexible Path,” San Antonio’s new energy resources plan.

The $16.3 million project, which will be constructed by RES Americas,was approved earlier this year by CPS Energy’s Board of Trustees. The site will consist of a 5 megawatt (MW) solar power facility and a 10 MW battery storage system located at 9800 W. Commerce in San Antonio.

In 2016, CPS Energy applied for and was awarded a New TechnologyImplementation Grant (NTIG) for $3 million from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) to fund part of the project cost. The primary objective of the NTIG program is to offset the cost of the implementation of existing technologies that reduce the emission of pollutants from facilities and other stationary sources which may include electricity storage projects in Texas.

The goals of the NTIG are to:

• Improve the quality of air in Texas in order to meet federal standards established under the Federal Clean Air Act (42 U.S.C. Section 7407).
• Facilitate the implementation of new technologies to reduce emissions from facilities and other stationary sources in the state.
• Adequately fund the implementation of new technologies that will make the state a leader in new technologies that can solve the state’s environmental challenges while creating new business and industry in the state.

CPS Energy says the project will allow for solar shifting. This means energy is captured when solar production is at its peak, generally between noon and 2 p.m., can be stored in onsite batteries and dispatched when energy demand is at its peak in San Antonio, between 3 and 7 p.m.

CPS Energy received and evaluated 22 proposals for an engineering, procurement and construction contractor for this project.

Additionally, there are plans to utilize an existing building on the site to develop an educational facility for students and the general public to tour and learn about innovative technologies being used by the utility.

The site is expected to be online in the summer of 2019.