Costs of Renewable Generation and Storage Fall by Almost 90%

One of the main excuses that people use to not become more sustainable at home is the cost, especially the initial investment in items like solar panels, energy storage and heat pumps. However, as the price of energy has increased over the last few years, there’s far more of an incentive to look to generate your own power. And, as homes get smarter, the up-front costs will be recovered much more quickly. For example, there are currently companies working on AI apps that will allow you to control when you feed energy into the grid so that the payout is highest. It is highly likely in the near term that you could charge both your household storage and the battery in your EV during the day, when it's the best time to generate energy, feed that energy into the grid in the evening when the pay out from the utility company is highest, and then charge your vehicle from the grid during the night when energy costs are lowest. All this will happen automatically.

It is a future that is not far away, and one of the last barriers to adoption is being removed, as a new study has revealed that the initial cost barrier to enter the domestic renewables market has fallen dramatically. The study by climate research institute MCC (Mercator Research Institute on Global Commons and Climate Change) has found that the cost of generating electricity from solar has fallen by 87%, and the cost of battery storage has dropped by 85%. It also found the price of wind power, heat pumps and other fossil-free technologies are also seeing a large drop in prices.

According to the research, batteries already are at a price point under $100 per kW/h – a lot less than the cost that some sources had predicted for the end of this decade. The study also found that storage costs will continue to fall, with the price premium for battery storage dropping a further 72% percent by 2030. The new research also finds that there is a comprehensive structural change happening that will make the sustainable transition cheaper as solar cells, batteries, heat pumps and wind turbines are benefiting from the trend towards granular technologies – solutions with simple elements that can be put together like Lego bricks to form larger systems. Sector coupling, the direct and indirect electrification of transport, heating and industry, will provide much more energy efficiency and create new options for storing green electricity.

It is a remarkable achievement for such a fall in prices to happen, despite the headwinds of COVID-19 pandemic, and the Russian invasion of Ukraine. As more battery chemistries that use abundant elements start to make it to market, the continuing large fall predicted in energy storage might even turn out to be conservative, which is good news for everyone.