profitability of energy storage. eagerly requests technologies providing flexibility. Energy storage can provide such flexibility and is attract ing increasing attention in terms of growing deployment and policy support. Profitability profitability of individual opportunities are contradicting. models for investment in energy storage.
Although academic analysis finds that business models for energy storage are largely unprofitable, annual deployment of storage capacity is globally on the rise (IEA, 2020). One reason may be generous subsidy support and non-financial drivers like a first-mover advantage (Wood Mackenzie, 2019).
The model found that one company’s products were more economic than the other’s in 86 percent of the sites because of the product’s ability to charge and discharge more quickly, with an average increased profitability of almost $25 per kilowatt-hour of energy storage installed per year.
Investment in energy storage can enable them to meet the contracted amount of electricity more accurately and avoid penalties charged for deviations. Revenue streams are decisive to distinguish business models when one application applies to the same market role multiple times.
Building upon both strands of work, we propose to characterize business models of energy storage as the combination of an application of storage with the revenue stream earned from the operation and the market role of the investor.
The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) took a first step and published a framework of eleven rules prescribing when energy storage is allowed to provide multiple services. The framework delineates which combinations are permitted and how business models should be prioritized (American Public Power Association, 2018).