As the role of renewable energy in California continues to grow, the need to store that power also expands. Renewables take on a higher profile as the state takes steps to fight climate change, but the intermittent nature of that power makes storage essential to its success.


A recent report by three state organizations outlines the steps California needs to take to provide more grid-scale storage. “Advancing and Maximizing the Value of Energy Storage Technology—A California Roadmap” is a collaborative project of the California Independent System Operator, the California Public Utilities Commission, and the California Energy Commission. It is intended to act as a platform to inform future regulations, initiatives and policies, but it does not lay out a specific plan to perform them.


The roadmap focuses on three of the biggest challenges facing storage expansion in California, as expressed by more than 400 industry stakeholders who provided input during the drafting of the document. These include expanding revenue opportunities, reducing the cost of integrating and connecting storage to the grid, and streamlining and clarifying policies to increase certainty.


The report recognizes that California already is a national leader in advancing storage technology, just as it is a leader in advancing renewable energy. It notes that several pilot projects are underway and the state is working toward commercialization of the technology.


State mandates also require more storage. In 2013, the state required investor-owned utilities to reach a combined target of 1,325 megawatts of energy storage by 2024. The storage mandate parallels similar requirements for greater generation of renewables. California already has one of the most ambitious renewable-energy portfolio standards, with a target of 33 percent renewables by 2020.


In his inaugural speech in January 2015, Gov. Jerry Brown announced that he wants to raise the bar even higher to 50 percent renewables by 2030. (For more on this, see page 20.)