Wednesday, 2 September 2026

The U.S. energy storage industry installed a record 20.2 GWh of new capacity in Q2, the largest quarter on record, according to CleanTechnica.

CleanTechnica also reported that U.S. battery energy storage capacity nearly doubled in the first 18 months of the Trump administration, as grid operators turned to storage to strengthen grid reliability.

EDF has signed two long-term battery optimization agreements with Trinasolar ISBU covering 179.8 MWh of grid-scale battery energy storage system (BESS) capacity, according to ESS News.

The first asset is the 40 MW / 80 MWh Ruby BESS near Aberdeen, Scotland, which ESS News reported is on track to be fully operational by October 2026.

The second is the Chatterley BESS in Gloucestershire, England, rated at 49.9 MW / 99.8 MWh, with commercial operation expected in March 2027.

EDF will manage both assets through PowerShift, described as the company's algorithmic trading and optimization platform. EDF stated that the long-term arrangement provides revenue certainty for Trinasolar ISBU.

A German research project named SHERLOCK is drawing up standardised quality classes for black mass, the intermediate material produced when lithium-ion batteries are shredded, according to electrive. The stated aim is to make battery recycling more efficient.

The consortium intends to route its technical specifications into formal standards work, submitting them to DIN and ISO standardisation committees, electrive reported.

Black mass currently trades without a common quality definition, and the cost of that gap has been quantified elsewhere. A study published as part of the EU Safeloop project puts current battery recycling losses at around EUR 1.90 per kg of battery pack, according to electrive.

Regulatory pressure sits behind the work. From August 2031, minimum proportions of recycled materials in new vehicle batteries will apply under the EU Battery Regulation. Recyclers meeting that threshold need recovered material whose composition and purity can be documented and priced consistently.

The partner list spans metrology institutes, applied research bodies and two companies. electrive lists the MEET Battery Research Centre at the University of Munster, PTB, BAM, Fraunhofer ISC and the Oko-Institut, alongside Pure Devices and phase VISION. The presence of national measurement and materials-testing institutes points to the measurement problem at the centre of the effort: quality classes are only as useful as the test methods that assign them.

Standardisation through DIN and ISO would move black mass grading from bilateral supplier agreements to published specifications, a step that matters for cross-border trade in the material. Recovered cathode metals from spent packs feed back into cell manufacturing, so a common grading language links waste handling directly to the recycled-content accounting that the EU Battery Regulation will require from August 2031.

Nigeria accounts for almost 400 MW of PV in a near-term solar mini-grid market that IRENA puts at 568 MW across Burkina Faso, Mali, Nigeria and Senegal, pv magazine reported. Burkina Faso ranks second on 91.7 MW, ahead of Mali on 56.3 MW and Senegal on 20.3 MW.

About 42,700 settlements make up the minimum addressable market behind that figure, with roughly 21 million residents in scope, according to the IRENA work cited by pv magazine.

Counting every site that batteries could make viable, rather than only the near-term slice, IRENA puts the total at approximately 397,270 settlements in the four countries, pv magazine reported.

More than 98% of the sites IRENA identified as suitable for mini-grids are best served by solar, according to pv magazine. Hydropower fits fewer than 2% of those sites and wind under 0.1%.

Supplying all of them at tier 2 demand levels by 2030 would take around 2.25 GWh of batteries across the four countries, IRENA says, as reported by pv magazine.

Africa's installed solar PV mini-grid capacity was 149 MW as of last year on IRENA's count, roughly a quarter of the 568 MW near-term pipeline in the four countries, pv magazine reported.

IRENA also sets out what happens if grid extension stalls: under restricted grid expansion scenarios, mini-grids could reach 60-110 million people, according to pv magazine.

MN8 Energy, Eos Energy Enterprises and Google said they are working together on a solar and storage project in West Virginia that will supply around-the-clock energy to the PJM grid, according to a GlobeNewswire release.

The site pairs 86 MW of utility-scale solar with two distinct storage technologies: 10 MW/100 MWh of Eos zinc-based long-duration storage and 70 MW/280 MWh of lithium-ion storage. The Eos system is designed to deliver 10 hours of storage.

Google will take the energy, the capacity, and the clean energy attributes produced by the project under the agreement.

MN8 estimates the capital investment at up to USD 350 million. Construction is expected to create approximately 200 jobs.

The three phases arrive separately. Solar is expected to reach commercial operation in 2028, followed by the lithium-ion storage in 2029 and the long-duration system in 2030.

Eos is described in the announcement as a U.S. manufacturer of zinc-based long-duration energy storage systems, while MN8 is described as a scaled power platform. The collaboration is aimed at growing demand in the PJM region.

The split between a shorter-duration lithium-ion fleet and a 10-hour zinc system gives the site two different discharge profiles from the same 86 MW solar resource.

NeoVolta and its subsidiary NeoVolta Power have signed a five-year supply and manufacturing agreement with South Korean manufacturer SK On, announced August 31, according to Solar Builder.

The agreement opens with SK On supplying 9 GWh of U.S.-manufactured lithium iron phosphate (LFP) battery cells to NeoVolta Power, Solar Builder reported. Deliveries run from 2027 to 2031.

Cell supply is only one leg of the arrangement. The two companies expect the initial cell contract and a broader pack manufacturing collaboration to support up to 18 GWh of combined activity, per Solar Builder.

On the manufacturing side, NeoVolta expects the partnership to expand its Pendergrass, Georgia facility into a two-line platform, which the company says could target up to 8 GWh of annual battery production by 2028, according to Solar Builder.

The LFP chemistry at the center of the deal has become the default for stationary storage packs, and the cells covered by the contract are to be produced in the United States.