from 'drill, baby, drill' to 'it's the storage, stupid': have batteries come of age? - home energy storage

Elon Musk introduced his Tesla Powerwall home and commercial energy storage division to the public last week, less than news of the launch of a new iPhone.
But the story is actually much bigger.
Reliable Energy storage coupled with sustained growth in distributed solar power generation partially driven by SolarCity could lead to long-term
Grid based on renewable energy
The end of carbon-based energy for power generation begins.
Another major energy use for oil is as fuel for transportation.
But combine a strong renewable power grid with Tesla cars or the next generation of electric vehicles (perhaps designed by Apple), which will launch the first car or Google by 2020) and a carbon.
The future of less energy not only looks possible, but also commercially viable, competing financially with coal, oil and even natural gas.
Is it time to shorten the big utilities? Maybe not yet.
Utility stock prices may already reflect the challenges they face in deteriorating monopoly business models.
What about oil companies?
There, it's too early to predict the time to end the game.
While storage may be the key to the transformation of renewable energy, to do so, extensive global infrastructure construction is required --
It will be expensive and will take time and deep-rooted power companies to hit.
So it's not going to happen in months or even years.
However, retail batteries are large enough to power the home and cost less than the back
In fact, we may already be at the beginning.
Where to invest now?
It depends, of course, on the investment time.
In the ups and downs of oil prices, traders during the day still have a lot of things to do, and now we have given up the "stable oil" model in the face of the volatile market for this commodity.
Long-term stock picks could find winners among the leading companies in the field, including Tesla Motors, SolarCity, Apple and Google.
But there are many other ways to invest in the industry.
Many businesses that could be the winners in the field are still in the venture capital phase, and individual investors are often unable to get that investment style unless his neighbors happen to open a tech company in his garage.
But the tech industry is taking crowdfunding, and websites like AngelList may be the best place to look for the next energy storage or smart grid launch --up.
And don't write off utilities.
They know more about what is happening than any outside investor.
While they will protect their current business model for as long as possible, they are also considering these changes and working with regulators to prepare for funding for grid upgrades, to transition to a more distributed generation future, as well as to invest in their own utility-level renewable energy generation.
In industrialized countries, power grids are always crucial, so utilities will enter the industry one way or another.
Investment funds are also in this market.
Many traditional private equity funds use energy as a core asset category.
Although the "green" fund was originally a social investment, it is no longer the case.
Real Asset funds like ours, Aquamarine Investment Partners, now see specific attractive renewable energy investments, such as distributed solar power generation facilities for large enterprises and institutions, which in our current
To be fair, we also focus on unconventional energy infrastructure, so we still see the future of oil and gas, and of course the same is true of our ten-year fund.
But as renewable investment opportunities begin to understand the changes in the energy sector, they are increasingly playing a role in our work and in many other investment funds.
"Drill, baby, drill" is a popular label in the 2008 election cycle, more emotionally appealing than the government's current "all above" policy, but the world may have been prepared for the moment "this is a storage, stupid.
We may have arrived.