Advances in wearable technology requires improvements with energy storage. Wearable devices are increasing in sophisticated and application, and power capacity needs to meet the demand.

New devices require energy sources that are both tiny, so they can be easily accommodated, and efficient, so that device can run for longer and perform more sophisticated functions. This requires the technological feat of fitting maximum energy density into a tiny space. By density this refers to the amount of energy that can be stored within a given device. A low density means that a battery does not hold charge for long and requires more regular ‘charge’ and ‘discharge’ cycles.

To improve energy capacity, researchers from King Abdullah University of Science and Technology have created a microsupercapacitor that exploits three-dimensional porous electrodes. The outcome is a more powerful, micro-sized power unit. The aim is for these devices to be integrated with the next wave of ‘smart’ wearable devices.

The power devices – or ‘micro-batteries’ – are based on films and they have a thickness of only a few micrometers. The film has considerable energy density. The devices are described as ‘microsupercapacitors.’ The devices use two different electrode materials for the cathode (nickel cobalt sulfide) and anode (carbon nanofiber.) The output is such that the microsupercapacitors achieve between one and forty microwatt-hours per square centimetre. This offers improved power capacity.

Discussing the application with Controlled Environments, Professor Husam Alshareef, who led the university team, stated: “while batteries must be charged at a constant voltage, a supercapacitor charges most efficiently by drawing the maximum current that the source can supply, irrespective of voltage.”

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A researcher at TU Graz says it is possible to combine the high-energy density of batteries with the high-power output of supercapacitors using liquid energy storage materials.

“Batteries release energy so slowly and take so long to charge because their energy storage materials are solid. This make it difficult for the ions to move. But as the ions in a supercapacitor move in a liquid, they are much more mobile,” explains TU Graz researcher Stefan Freunberger, pictured.

The redox active ionic liquid developed by Freunberger, in co-operation with a team from Montpellier University, consists of an organic salt that is liquid at 30°C.

“Our principle of an energy hybrid can offer enormous advantages,” Freunberger noted, “for example when applied in electric vehicles. So far, electric vehicles often carry a combination of different battery types or battery systems together with supercapacitors. If we had a single system that combines the benefits of both energy storage types, we could save considerable space and resources.”

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AUSTIN, TX–(Marketwired – Nov 29, 2016) – ViZn Energy Systems Inc. (ViZn), a leading provider of zinc and iron chemistry-based flow battery energy storage systems for utilities and microgrids, announced today that company CEO Ron Van Dell will be speaking at Greentech Media’s U.S. Energy Storage Summit that will take place December 7-8 in San Francisco, California. The session on energy storage standardization will be held from 2:45 PM – 3:15 PM PST on day two of the conference (Dec. 8), will be moderated by Ravi Manghani, Director of Energy Storage at GTM Research, and will include other leading storage industry executives.

“The GTM Energy Storage Summit is one of the most important conferences of the year for the energy storage industry, so I’m excited to have the opportunity to represent ViZn Energy next month,” said Mr. Van Dell. “We’re partnering with leading global suppliers of power conversion and systems controls to eliminate system integration risk and accelerate the customer’s time to revenue.”

Van Dell will bring his more than 30 years of business experience — including more than a decade at the helm of companies in the cleantech and energy industries — to the panel discussion called Standardization: Making Storage Plug-and-Play. Van Dell will also be speaking on Wednesday, December 14, at Power-Gen International in Orlando, Florida, from 1:30 PM – 3:30PM EST. Van Dell currently serves on the Industrial Advisory Board for the College of Engineering at Michigan Technological University, served as Chairman of the Clean Energy Council for the Austin Chamber of Commerce in 2012, was appointed by Austin City Council to its Local Solar Advisory Committee in 2012, serves on the Oversight Committee for the M-TRAC commercialization program of the Michigan EDC and as an Advisory Fellow, NSF Center for Next Gen PV, University of Texas.

ViZn Energy’s flow battery systems are capable of performing both high-power and long-duration services which enables utilities, C&I customers, and other end users to stack applications and incorporate multiple value streams. ViZn’s systems have an expected lifespan of 20 years with negligible degradation regardless of the duty cycle.

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It is often said that an energy storage project needs more than one stream of revenue to succeed and often regulatory barriers are seen as the biggest impediment to reaching that goal.

Indianapolis Power & Light’s 20 MW, 20 MWh Harding Street storage facility that entered service in May is one example. It provides grid services for IPL, but market rules in the Midcontinent ISO are not conducive to battery storage plants, so IPL has petitioned the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to find that MISO’s rules are discriminatory and need to be revised.

However, some storage companies have built a dual revenue stream into their business model. They see the market for energy storage not as a flow of services from on one side of the meter to the other, but as more of a two-way street serving customers on both sides of the meter.

A big part of Advanced Microgrid Solutions’ business, for instance, involves installing behind-the-meter energy storage systems, but as CEO Susan Kennedy said, “We are a utility-facing company.”

That was evident in the company’s July 2015 announcement of a deal to deliver 50 MW of energy storage for Southern California Edison. Under the deal, SCE will purchase capacity from the storage systems under a 10-year contract, and expects to use the electricity stored in AMS’ hybrid-electric buildings to offset the power once produced by the decommissioned San Onofre nuclear power plant and other soon-to-be retired gas-fired plants.

But the storage system to provide the utility those services will reside on the customer side of the meter in what AMS calls hybrid electric buildings. There, a combination of energy storage technology and analytical software will enable the building owners to improve energy efficiency, lower energy bills and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

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The US energy regulator has opened a consultation process on the integration of energy storage into a competitive market structure.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) said it wanted “to more effectively integrate electric storage resources into organised wholesale markets to enhance competition and help ensure that these markets produce just and reasonable rates”.

It has circulated a proposal and requested input from the country’s six regional transmission organisations (RTO) and independent system operators (ISO).

The proposal would require each RTO and ISO to alter their tariff structure in order to recognise the specific characteristics of energy storage resources and classify storage operators in a way that enables their participation in wholesale energy markets.

“Today’s announcement is a major step forward in transforming America’s power sector, and FERC’s action lays the foundation for competitive markets where energy storage and distributed energy resources are considered side-by-side with traditional grid assets,” said Matt Roberts, executive director of the Energy Storage Association.

“Regulatory and market certainty is paramount for our emerging industry, and the outcomes of this rulemaking will undoubtedly fuel continued energy storage growth – bringing even more jobs and investment in the advanced energy economy, and accelerating our transition to a more resilient, flexible, and sustainable grid,” he added.

The public have 60 days from the date of publication to respond. FERC began working with network operators in the spring.

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Rooftop solar energy is becoming a financially viable way for millions of U.S. consumers to generate their own electricity — and utilities are doing everything to kill the solar boom before it gains too much traction. Utilities in states such as Florida, Wisconsin, and Nevada have tried to undermine rooftop solar at the regulatory level and in ballot measures. As a reaction, voters have fought back and beaten the efforts to squash solar energy. 

The impact on residential solar companies Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA), Vivint Solar (NYSE:VSLR), Sunrun (NASDAQ:RUN), and SunPower (NASDAQ:SPWR) shouldn’t go unnoticed. They’re winning the policy war against utilities, and as they do, it’ll open a larger and larger market across the country. 

Policy wins are going to renewable energy

The election earlier this month was accompanied by a number of ballot initiatives that will impact solar energy for years to come. And for the most part, solar energy was a huge winner. 

Despite utilities’ spending $26 million to pass a referendum that would have undermined solar economics in the state, Florida voters rejected the utility referendum. The state now looks like it’ll have a bright solar future. 

In Nevada, less than a year after the public utility commission essentially killed the rooftop solar industry, residents overwhelmingly voted to break up Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE:BRK-B)-owned NV Energy’s long monopoly in the state. Customers have to be given energy choice, meaning more solar in one of the country’s sunniest states. 

In the past, Wisconsin has tried to add fees to utility bills that would kill solar energy before it ever got started, but those attempts were rejected by the court. 

There’s an important trend here for utilities and solar companies: When solar energy goes on the ballot or to the court, it wins. That should have every utility in the country frightened because that gives millions of customers choice regarding their energy needs. 

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Accompanying the launch of the its Powerwall 2.0 offering, Tesla will reportedly begin completely overhauling many retail locations to focus more on the energy storage side of its business.

The retail facelift will reportedly involve the installation of various interactive displays explaining how the firm’s energy storage products work in simple language.

Importantly, this overhaul will also involve a transition to the company actually taking Powerwall 2.0 orders in the store, as well as online, according to Business Insider (previously, all ordering of the Tesla Powerwall was done online).

Notably, the move closely follows the SolarCity acquisition, and likely serves as a sign of things to come. Presumably, the company will be highlighting the recently unveiled solar PV roof options at its stores soon enough as well.

The display of stylish all-electric vehicles, home energy storage systems, and solar PV roofs all in one store will lead to some nice sales synergies. As an imaginary example: someone stops in for a home energy storage system, takes a closer look at a Tesla Model 3 on display, reads/watches the information on display concerning Autopilot, and decides to put down a deposit for one. Or: someone stops in to work out the details of a vehicle purchase, and decides after looking around that the solar roof options are more affordable than they would have guessed, etc.

Business Insider provides more: “Tesla has already updated some stores in key locations across North America, Europe, and Australia. The company chose to focus the rollout on markets with the most demand for energy products, but the company plans to add its energy products to more stores in the near future.”

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Tesla is perhaps best known for its electric cars, but the company has another prominent business as well.

Its Tesla Energy division markets stationary lithium-ion battery packs for energy storage.

Energy-storage systems can increase the utility of home solar arrays, meaning Tesla Energy will likely become more important now that Tesla is set to acquire SolarCity.

DON’T MISS: Tesla, SolarCity, and Ta’u: sun, storage batteries, clean energy (video)

The acquisition of SolarCity—which, like Tesla, is controlled by Elon Musk—was approved by Tesla shareholders last week.

Tesla’s retail stores may soon get an update to reflect the newfound prominence of energy storage.

The company also plans to revamp the majority of its retail stores to better showcase its energy-storage products, reports Business Insider.

Citing an unnamed Tesla spokesperson, the website said Tesla will remodel its stores to showcase the Powerwall 2 home energy-storage battery pack, and will install new graphics explaining energy-storage products.

Customers will now also be able to order Powerwall battery packs in stores; they were previously available to order online only.

According to Business Insider, Tesla has already remodeled some stores in North America, Europe, and Australia.

These initial locations were chosen to get the new look because they were in local markets Tesla viewed as having particularly strong demand for energy storage.

But Tesla now reportedly plans to offer its energy-storage battery packs at a larger number of locations.

The Powerwall 2 was unveiled by Elon Musk at a media event last month, alongside solar roof tiles for SolarCity.

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As the cost of renewable energy continues to decline and intermittent clean power sources such as wind and solar gain ever an ever larger foothold in the global energy mix, the ability to store energy that can be quickly dispatched when needed has become as important as the development of renewables themselves.

Robust storage options could allow for greater integration of intermittent renewables, as they facilitate flexible capacity-building that relies far less on coal and gas-fired plants for baseload generation, meaning energy storage is a key step in the journey to wean the world off its fossil fuel addiction.

But cracking the energy storage conundrum is no easy feat. Advanced flow and lithium-ion batteries with storage capability hold great promise, but costs are high and technical aspects are complex as these technologies develop. Pumped-storage hydroelectricity – or ‘pumped hydro’ – is currently the world’s highest-capacity and most efficient energy storage method, but this option, which uses off-peak electricity to pump water from a lower-elevation reservoir to a higher one and then releases the water through turbines during high-demand hours, is limited by the geographical and infrastructure requirements involved.

US-based start-up Quidnet Energy is hoping to fill a gap in the market with an underground pumped hydro concept. The company, co-founded by energy entrepreneur Aaron Mandell and former Saudi Aramco petroleum engineer Howard Schmidt, is currently using rock formations in abandoned oil and gas wells to store pressurised water, which can later be run through a turbine to feed electricity back into the grid.

Quidnet has its first field demonstration plant up-and-running in Erath County, Texas, which has produced good results indicating that the concept is technically workable, and building a commercial-scale demonstration plant in 2017 is the next step. Further down the line, the company intends to drill its own reservoirs separate from the oil and gas sector’s leftover wells, and even integrate solar generation to create baseload solar power plants.

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