American grid-scale battery deployments hit 3.3 GW in Q1 alone — up 54% year on year — as China moves to squeeze out lower-grade polysilicon capacity with a mandatory efficiency standard.
The U.S. added 3.3 GW / 8.4 GWh of grid-scale battery storage in Q1 2026, a 54% year-on-year increase and a new quarterly record.
CATL announced a 2 GWh sodium-ion battery energy storage deployment in Eastern Europe while ESS Inc shipped a 500MWh long-duration iron-flow system in the U.S., both commissioning in 2026.
China issued a mandatory energy-efficiency standard for polysilicon production, effective January 2027, that approximately 55% of current manufacturing capacity would fail to meet.
Researchers at the Max Planck Institute published results on a solid-state battery architecture projecting energy densities sufficient for up to 745 miles of EV range per charge.
CS PowerTech, a subsidiary of Canadian Solar, opened a heterojunction solar cell manufacturing plant in Indiana, creating more than 1,200 jobs and targeting premium-efficiency cells for the U.S. market.
In filings related to challenges against cancelled clean energy grants, Trump administration lawyers acknowledged that $7.6B in cancellations were concentrated in Democratic-leaning states.