Salt, silicon or graphite: storage beyond lithium ion (The Guardian

Dyani Lewis / The Guardian

Between the political bickering following a spate of blackouts in South Australia and the billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk tweeting that he had a fix , and then the South Australian government announcing that it will build a grid-connected battery storage facility, interest in renewable energy storage has never been higher.

While lithium ion batteries sold by Tesla and others are perhaps the most widely known storage technology, several other energy storage options are either already on the market, or are fast making their way there.

All are hoping to claim a slice of what, by all indications, will be a very large pie. The Australian Energy Market Operator forecasts that more than 1.1m new battery storage systems will be installed in Australian households by 2035 . And, according to a 2015 report by the Climate Council , battery storage capacity is expected to grow 50-fold in under a decade.

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