Breakthrough Energy, founded by Bill Gates, the European Energy Storage Association (EASE), the European Photovoltaic Industry Association and the European Wind Energy Association have jointly released an open letter calling on the European Commission to recognize the critical role of energy storage systems in the security of European energy supply. The agencies said energy storage should be mainstreamed into the European Commission's implementation of the REPowerEU action plan and ongoing review of electricity market design.
The four industry groups say the EU will not be able to achieve a net-zero electricity system without a rapid expansion of energy storage deployments, putting it at risk of a persistently volatile fossil energy market.
The open letter claims that the EU urgently needs to roll out large-scale energy storage solutions quickly, noting that much of today's grid balancing is done by carbon-emitting sources such as gas-fired power plants, in addition to suggesting that energy storage systems, alongside renewables, should be part of a political priorities and lays out three actions the European Commission could take.
The first is to set a 2030 energy storage target, as part of the REPowerEU scheme implemented in May, as was done for renewables and hydrogen. European governments should publish their own roadmaps and actions to develop energy storage systems.
They want the European Commission to promote the adoption of energy storage technology. One way is to expand CFDs under the Innovation Fund to energy storage, while another is to provide guidance on the design of stand-alone and managed renewables + energy storage tenders in line with EU state aid guidelines.
Energy storage should also be mainstreamed into the European Commission's implementation of the REPowerEU action plan and ongoing review of electricity market design.
"The identification and elimination of energy storage system deployments are major obstacles, such as the lack of implementation and licensing bottlenecks of EU legislation in member states," the open letter reads.
“With the U.S. and China strongly supporting energy storage, the European Union has been slow to deploy, but Europe has invested in development,” said Ann Mettler, European vice president of Breakthrough Energy, which Bill Gates and others founded in 2015. A lot of money, especially in long-duration energy storage. We now need to reap the benefits of these efforts through the large-scale deployment of energy storage system technology.”
Patrick Clerens, secretary general of the European Energy Storage Association (EASE), added: “We need to replace renewables and energy storage systems with flexibility now, not wait a few more years.”
Breakthrough Energy is made up of several companies, including Breakthrough Energy Ventures, which invested in long-duration energy storage technology groups such as Antora Energy two months ago.
