Electricity Storage: Technologies, regulation and policies supporting small- and large scale deploym

New Delhi, India

The International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) held its third International Energy Storage Policy and Regulation Workshop, intended to contribute to national and global electricity storage roadmaps. The workshop – organised as part of REmap 2030, IRENA’s roadmap to scale up renewable energy – took place alongside the 2nd International Conference & Exhibition on Energy Storage and Microgrids in India, held in New Delhi on 3-5 December by the India Energy Storage Alliance.

The specific aim was to identify technological solutions, regulatory challenges and the policies needed to support the accelerated deployment of decentralised and utility-scale renewables, as well as to identify opportunities for international cooperation and exchange of best practices and lessons. Workshop participants included policy-makers, industry representatives, academics and other relevant stakeholders.

The workshop was opened by Secretary Upendra Tripathy of the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), followed by two panel discussions on the opportunities for energy storage for renewables-based microgrids and the integration of utility-scale renewable power generation projects. The proceedings of this workshop can be found here.

A number of panelists provided the following presentations:

  • Mr. Gurbuz Gonul, Acting Director, Country Support and Partnership, International Renewable Energy Agency, IRENA’s Electricity Storage Roadmap (presentation)
  • Mr. Rahul Walawalkar, Executive Director, India Energy Storage Alliance, Opportunities and Challenges for small scale storage for renewable off grid solutions (presentation)
  • Mr. Shudhir K. Chaturvedi¸ Chairperson, Joint Electricity Regulatory Commission for Goa, and all Union Territories, Storage of Solar power for Micro Grids in the Islands of Andaman & Nicobar, as well as Lakshadweep (presentation)
  • Mr. Vipluv Aga, R&D Project Leader, Alstom Power, Concentrated Solar Power with Storage (presentation)

Previous electricity storage workshops took place in March 2014 in Dusseldorf, Germany (The Transformative Power of Storage) and in November 2014 in Tokyo, Japan (Self-Consumption of Renewables).