The US market for solar-plus-storage is predicted to grow more than twentyfold in the next three years, rapidly expanding from US$42 million in value this year to US$1 billion by 2018, according to GTM Research.
The research firm has issued 'The future of solar-plus-storage in the US', a report which examines the market for behind-the-meter PV paired with energy storage. Strong growth in solar PV installations, battery costs which fall as much as 30% annually, incentives offered at state level, net energy metering charges and the need for resilient and uninterrupted energy supply are all cited as drivers for this predicted growth.
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The head of GTM’s storage division, Ravi Manghani, said the report quantifies “end-customer economics for three end-customer types across multiple utilities”.
According to Manghani, his team found that “for some of those customer-utility combinations, the economics look promising even today”.
According to GTM, energy storage is nearing a “tipping point” in the US, with California’s three investor-owned utilities mandated to install over 1.325GW by 2020 in order to accommodate renewables and protect the grid and Tesla poised to open up its Nevada ‘Gigafactory’, which will provide battery packs to stationary storage applications as well as to the company’s range of EVs. A tax incentive of up to 30% is available for storage if coupled with solar in certain circumstances and using storage can lower the upfront cost of a PV installation, by reducing the required system size.
A full version of this story is available on PV Tech Storage.