Energy storage is up. In 2024, the United States saw 12.3 gigawatts of storage installed, according to a new report — setting a new record for the second year in a row.
The latest U.S. Energy Storage Monitor report, from the American Clean Power Association and Wood Mackenzie, found that the country has 12.3 gigawatts and 37.1 gigawatt-hours of new storage, up 33% and 34% over 2023.
There were market differences in the markets for grid-scale versus residential storage.
Texas and California, hotbeds for both solar and storage, experienced the most growth in grid-scale storage specifically, with 61% of the country’s total installed capacity across the two states. According to the latest Sustainable Energy in America Factbook, power demand in Texas has climbed 17% since 2021, jumping to 86 GW last year — and at the same time the state has become the largest market for new utility-scale solar. To meet that new load, energy storage is needed to keep power reliable, and prices down.
2024 was also the year that the market expanded beyond those leading states; the remaining 39% of installations were clustered in 13 other states, including Arizona, New Mexico, and Oregon. In 2025, grid-scale storage is expected to reach a new high of 13.3 GW.
Meanwhile, home storage installation rates are still far below those for residential solar, but things are moving in the right direction. The residential storage market reached a record of nearly 1.3 GW in 2024 — a full 57% above 2023.
In California, a controversial change in net metering rules that took effect in 2023 initially seemed to both boost storage and pull down solar panel prices. However, according to the Energy Storage Monitor, the state’s “growth has been slower than originally expected, as NEM 2.0 project pipelines persist.”
The strong deployment numbers in 2024 have caused the analysts to increase their 2025 forecasts accordingly, to 15 GW, or 7% above last quarter’s prediction. That said, growth this year is expected to come down some from 2024: 25% rather than 33%. According to Allison Feeney, research analyst at Wood Mackenzie, this comes down to uncertainty.
“Due to policy uncertainties, growth will likely slow down this year and in subsequent years,” Feeney said in a press release; those uncertainties include a lack of clarity about whether Inflation Reduction Act tax credits will endure, as well as about the impact of tariffs. As a result, the researchers created a high and a low energy storage forecast — with a potential swing of 27 GW in cumulative installations over the next five years between the two possible scenarios.
But whatever the impacts, Feeney added, they aren’t likely to be permanent: “Growth will pick back up toward the end of the decade, with a projected 81 GW total installations from 2025 to 2029,” she said.
