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The reason we don't see new grid storage tech succeed is because there is no market for it. Seems like there ought to be a market... every electrical system in

The reason we don't see new grid storage tech succeed is because there is no market for it. Seems like there ought to be a market... every electrical system in the world would be much better off with gobs of storage. But there isn't... because... Electrical markets are very highly regulated. The barriers to market entry are astronomical and quite frankly uninvestable. When I was active in the space, no utility would even think of buying a piece of new hardware unless the design had a 7 year track record in actual on grid operation for a respected utility. Not quite a pure circular fallacy, but darn close. There are a lot of good technologies out there that really do work. But they can't attracted funding to scale because they simply can't reliably access the market. The grid scale energy storage problem is social, not a technical.

sanderjd 3y ago
Batteries have been quite important in Texas for the past few weeks during unusually warm evenings with unusually little wind. They've had a number of days recently requiring emergency deployment, and a sizable chunk of that came from batteries, setting some records with peaks over 2.5GW. (There is also significant battery deployment in CAISO.)
- WhatsTheBigIdea 3y ago
  Yes! Texas (ERCOT) is by far the easiest electrical market to enter. It is also one of the highest volatility markets which is also good for storage. But the barriers to entry are still way too high to call it anything like an open market. To be sure, traditionally there are somewhat good reasons to have high barriers to entry into electrical markets. But in the context of climate change, those reasons seem more like tradition than real reasons.
moffkalast 3y ago
Sounds like someone needs to jack up fossil fuel prices to astronomical levels and the market will suddenly appear from seemingly nowhere.
Turskarama 3y ago
Historically yes, but I think the seal is broken now and there's going to be huge amounts installed in the next 5-10 years.

sanderjd 3y ago

Batteries have been quite important in Texas for the past few weeks during unusually warm evenings with unusually little wind. They've had a number of days recently requiring emergency deployment, and a sizable chunk of that came from batteries, setting some records with peaks over 2.5GW. (There is also significant battery deployment in CAISO.)

WhatsTheBigIdea 3y ago
Yes! Texas (ERCOT) is by far the easiest electrical market to enter. It is also one of the highest volatility markets which is also good for storage. But the barriers to entry are still way too high to call it anything like an open market. To be sure, traditionally there are somewhat good reasons to have high barriers to entry into electrical markets. But in the context of climate change, those reasons seem more like tradition than real reasons.

moffkalast 3y ago

Sounds like someone needs to jack up fossil fuel prices to astronomical levels and the market will suddenly appear from seemingly nowhere.

Turskarama 3y ago

Historically yes, but I think the seal is broken now and there's going to be huge amounts installed in the next 5-10 years.