California should up storage funds to give the finger to natural gas

California is searching high and low in its quest to pioneer the shape of the US storage market, with new grant funding made available to facilitate research around long-duration methods. While it is true that scaling Lithium Ion to utility scale is probably not feasible, the low level of allocated funding suggests a serious bias towards green hydrogen or compressed and frozen air. If California is serious in weaning itself off natural gas, we would argue that funding may be better placed in gravity-based storage or developing a smart microgrid infrastructure in light of the continuous boom in residential storage. The State of California’s Energy Commission (CEC) tabled the solicitation at the end of December, announcing $11 million in research…