The Munich event focused on battery storage safety standards, fire-response gaps and insurance models as Germany’s BESS capacity reaches 19 GW.
Huawei Digital Power and industry partners held the inaugural 2026 PV & ESS Safety Industry Summit in Munich on June 24 during Intersolar Europe 2026, centering discussions on safety risks and insurance gaps tied to the large-scale rollout of PV+ESS (solar plus energy storage systems). Speakers from Huawei, BVES, the Netherlands Institute for Public Safety, DNV, VDE and WTW examined battery fire risks, evolving test standards, digitalized risk management and insurance design. Huawei executives said PV+ESS safety depends on integrating electrochemistry, thermal management, power electronics, digital technology and AI, and argued that quantitative safety assessment should be linked more closely with insurance mechanisms. Gerrit Lührung of BVES said Germany’s total BESS capacity stands at 19 GW and that the sector must navigate regulatory limits and new safety guidelines over the next three years. Tom Hessels of NIPV said battery fires are increasing and called for wider release of UL 9540A (battery fire testing standard) data and round-the-clock manufacturer support for fire departments. DNV’s Mikel Arrese-Igor said about 70% of BESS defects occur at the system level, adding that full-scale tests such as those conducted on Huawei’s LUNA2000 system can validate safety-by-design approaches. Huawei’s Zhu Jun said the sector faces four main challenges: thermal runaway, high-voltage insulation failure, grid disturbance and limited digitalization. He said Huawei has built a safety framework using high-temperature-durable insulation, positive-pressure smoke exhaust, smart string dual-stage architecture and AI-based early warning to prevent thermal runaway propagation in extreme scenarios. The summit also featured the release of the Grid-Forming ESS Safety White Paper, which addresses quantitative assessment, attack-defense testing and digitalization pathways, with the stated aim of guiding R&D, regulation and construction toward a unified safety framework.