Volkswagen enters C&I energy storage business with Elli

With demand for energy storage systems in Europe expected to soar in the coming years, the Volkswagen Group is diversifying its business in a bid to secure its slice of the burgeoning market.

Last week, Europe’s largest car maker announced its entry into the commericial and industrial (C&I) energy storage space with its established EV charging and energy brand Elli.

Together with partners along the value chain, Elli will develop, build, and operate massive industrial-scale battery energy storage systems. The first Elli battery storage projects could be set up as early as next year and used “to supply customers and for arbitrage transactions on the electricity market,” the company said.

Largest projects with up to 700 MWh storage capacity

The largest projects in the Elli project pipeline currently have an output of up to 350 MW and a storage capacity of 700 MWh. Such projects would almost double the total storage capacity installed in Germany, which currently amounts to around 1 GWh.

“Germany and Europe need sufficient storage solutions to meet the increasing demand and to compensate for the volatile feed-in of renewable energies. Our investment in stationary battery storage systems is therefore a significant contribution to the sustainable transformation of the energy supply,” says Volkswagen Group Board Member for Technology Thomas Schmall.

According to the German Federal Network Agency’s quarterly report on grid congestion management, 10,500 GWh of electricity from renewable energy sources was curtailed in 2023 alone. According to the Battery Charts developed by a team of reasearchers at Germany’s RWTH Aachen University, the nation currently has 13.9 GWh of storage installed, including around 550 MWh of industrial and 1.6 GWh of utility-scale battery storage systems.

Back in 2022, Fraunhofer Institute estimated a demand for battery storage systems of over 100 GWh by 2030.

“We see high financial potential in this business area and the opportunity to develop Elli into a holistic energy provider in Europe,” explains Giovanni Palazzo, CEO Elli.