• Published: September 2022
• Edition: 1st
• Status: Future

Objectives

The objective of this project is to produce a guidance document with two main aims:

1. To summarise the key environmental, material and other sustainability issues of common energy storage technologies, drawing primarily upon existing lifecycle analyses conducted in academia, and other sources (other studies, news, etc.).  This section would service as both an illustrated case study/case studies demonstrating the lifecycle analysis, but equally importantly, this would provide some immediate information for operating companies to use when deciding which energy storage technologies to implement in the short-medium term.
2. Provide guidance on conducting a lifecycle analysis of energy storage technology. This is not meant to be an in-depth ‘how to’, but rather companion guidance to a commonly used lifecycle analysis methodology, e.g. ISO 14040.

The purpose of the guide is to:

• Provide industry (including investors, asset owners/operators, regulators, planners, local government etc.) with up-to-date information on the short, medium and long-term sustainability of common energy storage technologies.  This will help industry to better plan its strategy in building energy storage capacity in the medium to longer terms – e.g. are certain technologies going to fall foul of future environmental regulations, have unintended social costs, or likely to be economically unsustainable due to material shortages?
• Provide guidance to help industry to conduct their own lifecycle analyses so that, in 5 years time and the guidance is starting to become outdated or technology has moved on, industry can do its own analysis of new technologies in order to decide whether to adopt or not.  What aspects of the lifecycle need to be considered? (e.g. mining, water usage etc.).

Project status

11/03/2021: Project is awarded to Earth Shift Global.

12/04/2022: 1st draft available for stakeholder consultation

Instructions for review:

1. Download the 1st draft report: here

2. Download the comment proforma: here

3. Review the report for its usability, technical validity (e.g. sound science/good practice), and any omissions (within the apparent scope). Mark your comments in the proforma (giving page number, section number etc.).

4. Submit your comment proforma to Stuart King e: sking@energyinst.org by the deadline.

Deadline: 17:00 BST, 23 May 2022