Smarter tools for integrating storage and renewables across Europe

As Europe accelerates electrification and integrates unprecedented volumes of renewable energy, the challenge is no longer just building capacity, it is orchestrating storage and generation intelligently to maintain resilience and economic efficiency.

The AGISTIN (Advanced Grid Interfaces for innovative STorage INtegration) interfaces are designed to facilitate power conversion, coordinate diverse distributed energy resources (DERs) and ensure compliance with grid codes while unlocking new opportunities for ancillary services.

AGISTIN is developing a portfolio of simulation, design and optimisation tools which promise to transform how energy systems are planned, operated and scaled, particularly from the point of view of industrial users. The project’s optimisation suite is tailored to help large sites and energy intensive operations rapidly design and operate systems that combine renewables and storage. 

By doing so, industrial users can connect more efficiently to the grid, reduce costs and deliver flexibility services that strengthen overall grid stability.

Optimisation toolkit for the energy transition

At the heart of AGISTIN lies a suite of simulation, design and optimisation tools that together aim to reshape how storage, energy consumers and grid operators interact.

These tools include:

• Designing smarter grid interfaces: For industrial sites dealing with heavy loads, renewables and storage, AGISTIN provides tools to design the electrical grid interface. These help decide whether to use AC or DC coupling, which storage technology fits best, and what size converters or batteries are needed. The topology and storage selection/sizing tools make installations more cost-effective, tailored and future-proof.
• Real-time optimisation and control: Design alone is insufficient; effective integration requires advanced optimisation and real-time control. AGISTIN is also developing advanced frameworks that manage integrated systems in real time. Such integrated configurations, combining storage, load, and renewable generation, enable dynamic responses to evolving grid conditions, facilitate the provision of ancillary services (e.g. frequency support), and preserve system stability despite variability in renewable output, all while ensuring adherence to grid code requirements. By enabling DC coupling of renewables, storage and industrial loads, sites can boost self-consumption, cut electricity costs and reduce emissions.
• Exploring novel storage concepts: Beyond batteries, AGISTIN is investigating how irrigation canal systems could serve as pumped hydropower energy storage. By combining pumps, turbines and electricity storage, the project’s Python-based planning tool can size equipment and define operation strategies under different scenarios. These techno-economic models help test the viability of such unconventional systems, potentially unlocking new flexibility assets in agriculture and water management.

How smarter storage integration helps Europe

Europe’s push for electrification, from hydrogen production to EV charging, is driving huge demand on grid connections, often requiring costly upgrades. AGISTIN’s tools could reduce grid capacity needs by 20–30%, saving Europe the equivalent of 50–60GW of reinforcement.

By enabling DC coupling of renewable generation, storage and industrial loads, coordinated through AGISTIN’s control and optimisation tools, industrial sites can significantly increase on-site renewables usage, lower electricity costs, improve self-consumption and reduce embedded emissions. 

Moreover, the real-time control frameworks will allow aggregated systems to provide grid services (e.g. frequency regulation, fast balancing) in compliance with grid code requirements, helping grid operators manage increasingly volatile, low inertia grids as renewables scale up. This enhances overall grid stability and resilience, supports higher shares of renewables and reduces curtailment. 

Importantly, many of AGISTIN’s models are being made open source, ensuring that system integrators, storage providers and industrial users can replicate and adapt its solutions, accelerating innovation across the continent.

From tools to real world deployment

AGISTIN is now moving from models to reality. Its tools are being validated through lab tests and field demonstrations, from EV fast charging hubs to hydrogen electrolysis plants and irrigation pumping sites. These trials are comparing different storage technologies (aqueous batteries, aluminium-ion batteries, irrigation-based storage) and interface designs, assessing not just technical performance but also economics, flexibility, and lifecycle impacts.

The potential is clear: AGISTIN’s set of tools could significantly accelerate the deployment of renewables and electrified industry, lowering costs, reducing grid strain and advancing Europe’s energy transition. For stakeholders (grid operators, industrial managers and storage providers) this marks a shift from ad hoc integration toward planned, optimised and replicable energy ecosystems.

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