German battery storage increased by 50% in 2024 says solar association

According to the German solar industry association (BSW), in 2024 the country’s energy system saw an addition of almost 600,000 new stationary battery storage systems come online, a 50% increase within the year.

According to a preliminary annual report by the BSW, almost 600,000 new battery storage systems were put into operation, including home, commercial and large-scale storage systems.

According to the association’s projections, based on data from the Federal Network Agency, more than 1.8 million storage systems with a capacity of around 19GWh were installed at the turn of the year. This is mathematically sufficient to store the average private daily electricity consumption of more than two million two-person households in Germany.

Commenting in a release was Carsten Körnig, general manager of the German Solar Industry Association: “Combining photovoltaic systems on your own roof with storage is now inexpensive and has become standard. Intelligent storage operation not only saves electricity costs for operators, but also relieves the burden on the grids and reduces the costs of the energy transition.”

The Association’s stats come as important energy laws are passed in the country, such as the agreement reached in the Bundestag between the SPD, the Greens and the CDU/CSU parliamentary group to remove market barriers for more flexible storage use.

“Storage is the fastest, cheapest and most effective instrument for integrating solar energy into the electricity market and the electricity grid. A rapid expansion of storage capacity is an important key to the success of the energy transition,” said Körnig.

The Association adds that, in this context, it is important to remove further market barriers in the next legislative period, to speed up approval procedures and to give appropriate consideration to the role of storage in upcoming reforms of the electricity market design and grid charges.

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According to the association of the solar and storage industry, it is also encouraging that, in addition to home storage, more and more commercial storage facilities and large-scale storage facilities in the megawatt class are being built.

In 2024, twice as much large-scale storage capacity was newly installed as in the previous year. The expansion of large-scale storage facilities is expected to pick up significantly in the next few years. According to current market forecasts, the installed capacity of large battery storage facilities could increase fivefold in the next two years.

German battery storage development

According to the BSW, the number of installed solar home storage systems grew by around 580,000 to around 1.8 million last year. In total, battery storage systems with a capacity of around 15.4GWh are installed in private homes.

While the newly installed home storage capacity, including expected late registrations, declined slightly by 7% in 2024 after several years of strong growth, the newly installed capacity of commercial storage grew significantly, increasing by 26% last year.

The total number of commercial storage systems installed in Germany rose by more than 60% within just one year to now over 38,000 storage systems, with a total storage capacity of almost 1.4GWh.

The strongest growth dynamics are currently seen in large-scale storage facilities, each with a capacity of over 1MWh.

Around 100 new large-scale storage facilities with a capacity of around 0.8GWh went into operation in 2024, which corresponds to a doubling of the expansion compared to the previous year (0.3 GWh). The installed large-scale storage capacity has now increased to almost 2.3 GWh.

All data in the BSW’s preliminary annual report is based on an evaluation of the market master data register of the Federal Network Agency (BNetzA) and on empirical values for expected late reports from previous years.