Solar energy storage market to touch nearly $2 billion in 2018

USA: Four new significant market research reports are available from Global Information (GII) for executives and their organizations seeking strong historic and forecast data to facilitate their decision-making concerning the global market for solar photovoltaics, solar storage and energy harvesting. The reports provide answers to key questions such as what are the growth prospects for solar PV over the next several years, what factors affect solar PV pricing, what are the major trends and macroeconomic factors influencing the solar PV market, what storage technologies for solar generated power are currently available, and more.

Despite the considerable technological innovation expected in energy storage, traditional lead-acid batteries will be the main revenue generator for solar energy storage over the next decade, accounting for more than $950 million in revenues in 2018. They are readily available and low cost, yet have poor lifetimes and are becoming commoditized products. Lead-carbon technology will improve the margins on this type of battery and will be used in solar farms and solar-based microgrid and will generate another $135 million by 2018.

There is also a growing level of interest in the use of lithium batteries in the solar sector and sales of these batteries are expected to generate $235 million by 2018. Lithium batteries are already being sold for residential and solar-power microgrid applications in the U.S. and in Germany. And in the next few years, Chinese solar energy storage firms seem likely to focus on lithium batteries given that China is a major source of lithium.

Nonetheless, NanoMarkets believes that the future of lithium batteries will depend heavily on continued government R&D subsidies. Otherwise in most countries, lithium batteries are likely to remain too expensive for solar applications.

This new NanoMarkets report provides an analysis of worldwide solar energy storage markets products including lead-acid, lead-carbon, lithium, NaS, sodium-nickel-chloride, and flow batteries, along with ultrabatteries and supercapacitors. Storage demand for both retail PV users and utility-scale solar is analyzed. Eight-year revenue and volume projections are included with breakouts by technology, and geography. Also included are profiles of leading-edge solar storage installations around the world.

Companies discussed in this report include: Abengoa Solar, Acciona, AES, Altair, Ambri, Axion, Brightsource, Cellenium, Cellstrom, Cogenra Solar, CSIRO, Daewoo, Deeya Energy, Ecoult, EDF, Endesa, eSolar, Exide, Fiamm Sonik, Firefly, Ford, GE, GeoBattery, Gildmeister, Hitachi, Ice Energy, International Battery, Johnson Controls, KEMA, Kyushu Electric, Maxwell, Mitsubishi, NEC, Nesscap, NGK, Panasonic, PG&E, Pratt & Whitney, Premium Power, Prudent Energy, RWE, SAFT, Siemens, Southern California Edison, RedT, Sumitomo, SunPower, SunVerge, SolarCity, Tokyo Electric, V-Fuel, VARTA, Xtreme Power and ZBB.