Germany’s energy storage market will grow 11-fold and reach $1B by 2021: GTM Research

GTM Research in its latest report  ‘The German Energy Storage Market: 2016-2021’, has revealed that Germany’s energy storage market will grow 11-fold in megawatt terms between 2015 and 2021 and will reach an annual value of $1.03 billion.

Germany is already one of the world’s leading energy storage markets. At the end of 2015, Germany was home to 67 megawatts of energy storage (128 megawatt-hours) with a value of $169 million. The nation’s declining feed-in-tariffs, high retail electricity rates and abundance of installed renewables makes it an attractive market for the energy storage value proposition.

The report states that , retail electricity prices for residential customers in Germany have increased 47 percent since 2006 and are unlikely to decrease in the near future. However, Germany offers homeowners an incentive known as KfW 275 for energy storage systems paired with a new or existing solar installations; the incentive covered up to 30 percent of the system costs between 2013 and 2015, currently covers 22 percent and steps down by 3 percent every half-year.

GTM Research anticipates that these factors will continue to help the residential segment maintain its top position in Germany, constituting 49 percent of all megawatts installed in 2021.

“Germany already possesses one of the world’s largest residential energy storage markets,” said Brett Simon, GTM Research energy storage analyst and author of the report. “A number of factors, including declining feed-in-tariffs, high electricity prices, and the KfW 275 program, are fuelling substantial interest in residential energy storage for self-consumption.”

The report identifies three opportunities for utility-scale energy storage, Germany’s second-largest storage segment. In the near term, the primary reserve market offers significant opportunity with six systems totalling 90 megawatts (140 megawatt-hours) expected to come on-line in 2016 and 2017. “Utility-scale systems have been deployed for primary reserve for the past few years, though significant deployments did not begin until 2016,” said Simon. “However, the market will saturate by the end of 2017, and thus utility-scale systems will need to pursue other value streams.”

According to GTM Research’s report beginning in 2018, Germany’s secondary reserve market will pick up steam, and distribution deferral will become increasingly attractive.

With just 2.7 megawatts deployed in 2015, non-residential storage is Germany’ smallest market segment.

The report notes that the segment lacks a clear economic case. However, as storage system prices decline and new business models emerge, non-residential storage could experience an uptick in growth. The report points to virtual power plants as one future avenue for deployments. Germany is a strong energy storage market with a significant presence from vendors across the entire storage supply chain. GTM Research anticipates 161 megawatts (274 megawatt-hours) of storage to be deployed in 2016.

GTM Research in its report  ‘The German Energy Storage Market: 2016-2021’, has revealed that Germany’s energy storage market will grow 11-fold in megawatt terms between 2015 and 2021 and will reach an annual value of $1.03 billion.