Goldman Sachs: Power demand surges from data centers drive an additional 50GWh of energy storage, with FLNC landing Nvidia’s exclusive agreement

Deep Tide TechFlow news report: According to a tide-oriented research study, Goldman Sachs’ July 16 energy storage report points out that power demand from data centers is surging, and expanding traditional grids will take four to eight years. With a deployment cycle of 12 to 18 months, energy storage has become the fastest solution. Goldman Sachs estimates that by 2030, the behind-the-meter energy storage opportunity in the US will bring about an incremental 50GWh. Combined with the 11GWh from 800V DC data centers, US energy storage deployments will reach 172GWh, a significant increase from the earlier 112GWh. Globally, annual energy storage installations are expected to reach 2,100GWh by 2040.

Goldman Sachs believes energy storage is shifting from an auxiliary device for renewable energy to a must-have requirement for AI infrastructure, which will change the industry valuation logic. At the stock level, FLNC (Buy) secured exclusive qualification as a battery partner for Nvidia DSX Vera Rubin; data center pipeline projects reached 12GW, up 30% quarter over quarter. CATL (Buy) has roughly a 30% share of the global energy storage market and has been used for the data center of Shanghai SenseTime. Tesla (Neutral) plans to deploy 46.7GWh of energy storage in 2025; its energy business is expected to generate revenue of $29 billion by 2028. Energy Vault (Neutral) received a valuation of 6x EV/EBITDA. LGES (Buy) expects North America’s ESS production capacity to reach 50GWh by the end of 2026. Also worth watching are Aterrs, Ford, Samsung SDI, Shoals, and Sungrow. Goldman Sachs emphasizes the need to distinguish between companies backed by real orders and those that are merely riding along with the theme.