As the Association celebrates its 40th anniversary, SolarPower Europe has launched its new tagline ‘SolarPower Europe: Solar, Storage, and Flexibility’ and announced new plans to establish a dedicated European battery storage platform. 

Walburga Hemetsberger, CEO of SolarPower Europe (she/her) said: “SolarPower Europe has represented the full European solar value chain for 40 years. From 50 MW of solar globally in 1985, to 350 GW alone in the EU last year, we are so proud to be powering the equivalent of 75 million EU households today. Each panel designed, built, and installed is one step forward for our energy security, our competitiveness, and our climate goals.”

EU Commissioner for Affordable Housing and Energy, Dan Jørgensen (he/him) said: “In today’s challenging context, we are at a defining moment for Europe. We need to boost our competitiveness, and bring down energy costs. We need to increase our security, to protect Europe’s place in the world. And we need to accelerate decarbonisation, to ensure the future of our planet. Our response to these challenges is clear:  we need to deliver the full benefits of a true Energy Union. An Energy Union that is cheaper, cleaner and more connected. To achieve this, I strongly welcome SolarPower Europe’s decisive push to ramp up solar energy in Europe.”

Complementing SolarPower Europe’s flagship flexibility reports, like the annual ‘EU Battery Energy Storage Systems Outlook’, or Mission Solar 2040, the Association has published two further reports. ‘Flexible Buildings, Resilient Grids’ and ‘Embracing the benefits of Hybrid PV systems’ focus on distributed and utility flexibility respectively.

Hemetsberger continues: “We’re hard at work ensuring that solar continues to deliver for Europe for another 40 years. Solar, storage, and flexibility are the fast track to a more secure, competitive energy system. We’ve adjusted our tagline accordingly, recognising our own work and acting as a call to action to policymakers.”

The new reports underline the potential of solar and storage delivering European energy security and competitiveness. ‘Embracing the benefits of Hybrid PV systems’ – which includes solar hybrid projects with storage, wind, or both – estimates that hybrid projects have a 10% lower Levelised Cost of Electricity compared to standalone projects. The report modelling also reveals how hybrid projects enhance security of supply by ensuring electricity generation even after sunset.

However, with regards to solar and battery hybrid utility projects specifically, the UK is outstripping the EU, hosting 62% of Europe’s ‘PV+BESS’ projects alone. By comparison, leading EU countries host much fewer solar and storage projects (Germany only hosts 6% of Europe’s total for example).

‘Flexible Buildings, Resilient Grids’ unpacks how electrified buildings, with digital flexibility tools, contribute to secure grids. Flexible buildings can provide more than half of the European energy systems daily flexibility needs, and around a third of the system’s annual needs. Importantly, a larger reliance on electrified flexible buildings to meet flexibility needs also means a lower dependence on fossil fuel imports and strengthened EU energy security.

The suite of SolarPower Europe storage and flexibility reports are set to be included on a new dedicated battery storage platform. The Battery Storage Europe platform will highlight storage case studies and regulatory best practices across Europe and operate as SolarPower Europe’s external arm of reinforced advocacy work on storage policy at the European-level.

The launch of the new reports and the announced rebrand comes during the annual SolarPower Summit, held in Brussels. EU Energy Commissioner Dan Jørgensen opened Day 2 of the Summit on Thursday 27th March. ‘Flexible Buildings, Resilient Grids’ was produced with thanks to our sponsors DMEGC and GridX.