Empowering sustainability assessment of energy storage
Abstract
Energy storage (ES) plays a vital role in decarbonizing energy systems, yet its sustainability implications remain critical during its rapid deployment across mobile and stationary applications. This study presents the first systematic literature review focused on the assessment methods applied to ES systems in the sustainability context, by analyzing 205 peer-reviewed studies from the past five years. The review identifies Techno-Economic Analysis (TEA) and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) as the most commonly employed methods, with a strong technological focus on hydrogen-based systems and batteries. In contrast, a limited number of studies consider social aspects in the sustainability context. An increasing trend toward integrated economic and environmental assessments is observed, though their coherence is often limited due to the absence of a standardized methodological framework. Most studies apply narrow system boundaries, frequently omitting critical life cycle stages such as the use phase and end-of-life. This paper provides a methodological overview of applied approaches, summarizes key indicators and gaps, and offers recommendations to enhance the comprehensiveness of ES sustainability assessments. Additionally, targeted suggestions are delivered for practitioners, method developers and policy actors to improve the quality and applicability of future assessment practices.
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Empowering sustainability assessment of energy storage Hüseyin Ersoy, * aj Manuel Baumann, a Merve Erakca, a Friedrich Jasper, a Marco Ferraro, b Viera Pechancov´ a, c Patrick Stuhm, a Maurizio Cellura, d Sonia Longo, d Manfredi Picciotto Maniscalco, b Roland Hischier, e Chiara Busto, f Alessandra Tacca, f Sebastian Dickler, g Petra Zapp, h Christina Wulf, h Yolanda Lechon, i Martina Haase, a Marcel Weil, a Tom´ as B. Ramos j and Stefano Passerini k Energy storage (ES) plays a vital role in decarbonizing energy systems, yet its sustainability implications remain critical during its rapid deployment across mobile and stationary applications. This study presents the first systematic literature review focused on the assessment methods applied to ES systems in the sustainability context, by analyzing 205 peer-reviewed studies from the past five years. The review identifies Techno-Economic Analysis (TEA) and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) as the most commonly employed methods, with a strong technological focus on hydrogen-based systems and batteries. In contrast, a limited number of studies consider social aspects in the sustainability context. An increasing trend toward integrated economic and environmental assessments is observed, though their coherence is often limited due to the absence of a standardized methodological framework. Most studies apply narrow system boundaries, frequently omitting critical life cycle stages such as the use phase and endof-life. This paper provides a methodological overview of applied approaches, summarizes key indicators and gaps, and offers recommendations to enhance the comprehensiveness of ES sustainability assessments. Additionally, targeted suggestions are delivered for practitioners, method developers and policy actors to improve the quality and applicability of future assessment practices. 1. Introduction The energy transition necessitates widespread deployment of renewable energy at all scales to achieve climate neutrality and support sustainable development. By 2050, wind and solar PV are projected to supply approximately 70% of global electricity generation, raising the overall share of renewables to about 90% in the International Energy Agency's (IEAindex: IEA\t: International Energy Agency?>) Net-Zero Emissions by 2050 (NZE) scenario. 1 Although the NZE roadmap was designed to align with limiting the global mean temperature increase to 1.5 °C –an outcome now widely regarded as highly ambitious given current trends –it continues to serve as an authoritative reference for technical benchmarking, highlighting the scale of the required transformation. Notwithstanding, an energy system largely dependent on uctuating renewables like PV and wind power requires exibilization options to balance supply and demand. The expansion of energy storage (ES) capacities is expected to play a key role in meeting this need, leveraging both conventional and emerging ES technologies to ensure grid stability and system reliability. Consequently, the NZE scenario projects a signicant global ramp-up in ES deployment until 2050. 2 Pumped hydro storage (PHSindex: PHS\t: Pumped Hydro Storage?>) as a conventional large-scale ES alternative has the highest share of the total global installed storage capacity, reaching 181 GW in 2023, where the battery energy storage (BESindex: BES\t: Battery Energy Storage?>) shows a rapid increase in capacity additions reaching approximately 85 GW a Institute for Technology Assessment and Systems Analysis (ITAS), Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Karlsruhe, Germany. E-mail: [email protected] b Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche –Institute for Advanced Energy Technologies “Nicola Giordano”(CNR-ITAE), Messina, Italy c Tomas Bata University in Zl´ ın (TBU), Zl´ ın, Czechia d University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy e Empa - Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology, St. Gallen, Switzerland f ENI S.p.A., Italy g Institut NOWUM-Energy, Fachhochschule Aachen, Aachen, Germany h Juelich Systems Analysis (ICE-2), Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH (FZJ), Jülich, Germany i Centro de Investigaciones Energ´ eticas, Medioambientales y Tecnol´ ogicas (CIEMAT), Spain j CENSE –Center for Environmental and Sustainability Research, CHANGE –Global Change and Sustainability Institute, NOVA School of Science and Technology, NOVA University, Lisbon, Portugal k Center of Transport Technologies, Austrian Institute of Technology (AIT), Vienna, Austria Cite this: Sustainable Energy Fuels, 2025, 9,5749 Received 26th May 2025 Accepted 11th September 2025 DOI: 10.1039/d5se00750j rsc.li/sustainable-energy This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2025 Sustainable Energy Fuels,2025,9,5749–5771 | 5749 Sustainable Energy & Fuels REVIEW Open Access Article. Published on 22 September 2025. Downloaded on 11/26/2025 8:25:49 AM. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. View Article Online View Journal | View Issue
capacity. 2 The NZE scenario forecasts a global BES capacity demand of 3–5 TW by 2050, including electric vehicles, utilityscale batteries and behind-the-meter applications. 3 In contrast, hydrogen-based storage using electrolyzers remains in its early stages, providing 4 Mt H 2 with limited adoption to date. However, a substantial increase in low-carbon hydrogen production (through electrolysis and fossil fuels with carbon capture use and storage (CCUS)) is projected in the NZE scenario to supply 70 Mt H 2 by 2030, mainly supporting the demand for the hard-to-abate industry and hydrogen-based fuel production, as well as power generation. 1 These developments underscore the critical role of ES technologies in facilitating a global energy transition. However, the scale of adoption, particularly for BES and hydrogen storage, raises concerns regarding costs, supply chain constraints, resource availability, and environmental and social impacts. 4–6 Thus, uncertainties and risks associated with the long-term sustainability of these technologies remain unresolved. Addressing these challenges requires comprehensive knowledge generation of the sustainability aspects of ES technologies to inform decision-making and promote their responsible integration. Given that sustainability is a multifaceted challenge, it is necessary to evaluate its economic, environmental and social dimensions in a systematic and transparent way. This emphasizes the need for robust assessment methods that provide reliable information to anticipate the long-term impacts of decisions made today. 7 Existing sustainability assessment approaches have been criticized for their methodological limitations, data availability and quality, as well as their contextual adaptability and comparability, all of which impact their effectiveness in guiding decision-making. 8,9 While current methods for evaluating the sustainability aspects of ES technologies have notable limitations, they remain the primary tools available for providing valuable insights. Given the growing signicance of these technologies and their rapid large-scale adoption, such evaluation has become more critical than ever. This study seeks to present an overview of the methodologies employed in the sustainability assessment of ES technologies, with a focus on the economic, environmental and social dimensions of sustainability, in order to observe the methods used and how they are applied in practice. Hence, a systematic review was conducted to analyze published peer-reviewed literature from the past ve years in terms of methods, technological scope, impact dimensions, and indicators. The collected information from the studies is used as a basis to support discussion in terms of state-of-the-art assessment methods, identied research gaps, methodological recommendations and the capacity of the methods to address the sustainability of ES as a whole. The ndings offer valuable insights for researchers, industry stakeholders and policymakers, supporting informed decisionmaking and fostering cross-disciplinary dialogue on ES sustainability issues. By identifying both strengths and limitations of current assessment practices, this review contributes to the ongoing development of more effective and holistic sustainability evaluation frameworks for ES technologies. 2. Methodology To ensure a systematic and comprehensive literature review of sustainability assessment methods for ES, the following search strategy was employed to identify relevant studies. The search was conducted using Lens Scholarly†, an academic database that indexes peer-reviewed journal articles, conference proceedings and other scholarly publications. The following Boolean search string was used to retrieve relevant studies: Title: (“sustainability assessment”OR “sustainability evaluation”OR “life cycle”AND (environmental OR economic OR social OR “public acceptance”)) AND (“energy storage”OR “battery”OR “hydrogen”OR “ammonia”OR “thermal energy storage”) AND year_published: (2019 OR 2020 OR 2021 OR 2022 OR 2023 OR 2024). The terms “sustainability assessment”OR “sustainability evaluation”were included in the title search to capture studies focusing on assessment methods. The addition of “life cycle” ensured the inclusion of assessments employing life cycle thinking, as this approach is used frequently for sustainability assessments. The phrases (environmental OR economic OR social OR “public acceptance”) were incorporated into the search string to ensure that studies addressing at least one of the three pillars of sustainability were captured. In this context, “public acceptance”is considered as a sub-aspect of the social dimension, since some studies address acceptance without explicitly framing it as a social criterion. The terms (“energy storage”OR “battery”OR “hydrogen”OR “ammonia”OR “thermal energy storage”) aimed to set the technological scope of the assessments. Specic terms such as battery, hydrogen or ammonia were included, since in many studies they are not combined with the keyword “energy storage”. Since the study aims to provide an overview of the assessment landscape, the lter on the timeframe covered the last ve years (2019–2024) to capture recent advancements and up-to-date methods in sustainability assessment of ES. The initial search query returned 424 studies, which were subjected to a multi-stage ltering process considering the inclusion or exclusion criteria. The main inclusion criterion was that the study employs an assessment method for the sustainability evaluation of ES technologies only on at least one sustainability dimension. First, a manual review of title and abstract was done based on the given criteria. Aer this renement the number of collected studies was reduced to 205 via exclusion of irrelevant studies, non-peer reviewed studies and duplicates. Further processing and data extraction were conducted with the assistance of articial intelligence, using a custom-trained GPT model, which was developed on the basis of ChatGPT. Using the model following predened attributes were extracted from studies, and double-checked to ensure consistency and accuracy: †The Lens scholarly works MetaRecords include the following primary data sources: Crossref, PubMed, OpenAlex and MicrosoAcademic (discontinued), with SI data from additional data sources including Unpaywall, OpenCitations, DOAJ, ORCID, ROR, PMC and publishers such as Springer Nature. 5750 |Sustainable Energy Fuels,2025,9,5749–5771 This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2025 Sustainable Energy & Fuels Review Open Access Article. Published on 22 September 2025. Downloaded on 11/26/2025 8:25:49 AM. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. View Article Online
Main technological category (e.g., electrochemical, chemical, thermal energy storage), Assessed technology (e.g., Li-ion battery, hydrogen, ammonia, compressed air energy storage), Assessed sustainability dimensions identifying the primary, secondary, and tertiary focus on economic, environmental, or social assessments, Applied assessment methods, Assessed system boundaries and chosen indicators. All extracted information was systemically organized, and inconsistencies were resolved through iterative renements, for instance unication of indicator or impact category terminology. For transparency reasons, the raw and rened collection, and extracted data is provided in the SI. 3. Energy storage within a transitioning global energy system A sustainable energy transition requires measures on both the supply and demand sides. The widespread roll out of renewables can be considered as the most fundamental step of this transition, increasing the share of wind and solar power generation. However, their uctuating generation characteristics can cause mismatches between demand and supply, which must be in balance at any time to guarantee safe energy provision. Imbalances must be tackled by exibility capabilities at different levels in order to avoid supply security and reliability issues. ES technologies are one of the exibility options that can mitigate such mismatches by timely decoupling of demand and supply. Furthermore, the phase-out of fossil-based exibilization options (e.g., natural gas, coal, oil etc.) underpins the potential of ES to grant the required exibility. Since the exibility requirements of various services dictate different technical features, available and emerging ES technological alternatives need to be reconsidered for enhancing sustainability while ensuring the service-related technical criteria. Hence, one cannot identify a single technology that can full the requirements of all applications, but rather a mixture of complementary technologies is needed. Fig. 1 provides a concise technical overview of conventional and emerging ES technologies based on the classications and facilities listed in the Database of the European Storage Technologies and Facilities. 10 The overview includes technologies that are cataloged, operational, or under development, referring to their technical features, application elds and corresponding energy system actors. The technical features, project application elds and services presented are related to the maturity of the technology, hence for immature technologies projections are incorporated to the best knowledge of authors. In terms of application elds, regional deviations might occur due to differences in the market structure and value recognition of ES services. As indicated in Fig. 1, ES technologies demonstrate distinct features (e.g., reaction time, charge/discharge prole, or energyto-power ratio) enabling them to provide services on all levels of the energy system, including generation, transmission, and distribution. 10,11 PHS (both off-river and open-loop) is a longstanding form of mechanical ES, and remains the primary, costefficient and reliable non-fossil exibility option. Together with Compressed/Liquied Air Energy Storage (CAES or LAES), these mechanical ES systems will continue to provide services for the mitigation of shortand mid-term (i.e., hours to days) supply decits, including generation support and bulk storage, transmission and distribution services as well as ancillary services where high-energy and high-power capacities are required. 11,12 The main challenge for expanding the capacity of these technologies beyond techno-economics is associated with ecological and geographical constraints, as well as social acceptance limiting their use. 13 Chemical ES technologies, such as Power-to-Hydrogen (P2Hindex: P2H\t: Power-to-Hydrogen?>), Power-to-Ammonia (P2Aindex: P2A\t: Power-to-Ammonia?>), and Power-toMethane (P2Mindex: P2M\t: Power-to-Mehane?>), are considered promising due to their high gravimetric energy density (hydrogen z120 MJ kg −1 , ammonia z18.6 MJ kg −1 , methane z50 MJ kg −1 ; lower heating values), their ability to store energy over long durations (weeks to months), and their ease of transportability 14 mainly in the Power-to-X context. Power-to-X technologies aim to convert excess renewable electricity into storable and transportable chemicals and energy carriers. Hence, besides their role in the decarbonization of the hard-toabate industrial sectors (e.g., steelmaking, chemicals) these technologies are expected to provide additional exibility to the energy system by providing midto long-term ES services due to their large storage capacities, exibility, and scalability. 15 The main key performance indicators (KPIs) hindering wide adoption of chemical ES applications can be named as high costs (both fuel production and utilization infrastructure and produced fuel cost), as well as low round-trip conversion efficiencies (20–40%). 16 Besides electricity storage, these chemical ES systems may also help to meet future demand for fuels used in heat applications, particularly as conversion technologies advance such combined heat and power engines for hydrogen. In this way, they can substitute conventional fuels in sectors where electrication is not possible or feasible. Electrochemical ES technologies include a wide range of solid-state, ow, and semi-solid systems, categorized according to the physical state of the reactants. Within solid-state systems, Li-ion and lead-acid batteries are the most common, followed by Na-ion batteries as an emerging promising alternative. 17 Flow systems encompass several technologies such as vanadium redox-ow (VRFB), zinc–bromine and iron–chromium batteries, with VRFBs currently appearing to be most promising due to their large practical energy and power capacities. Metal-air batteries (e.g., Li-air, Zn-air) represent another electrochemical alternative, although in terms of market readiness they remain among the least advanced technologies, with technological readiness levels typically in the range of 3–4. In general, batteries are considered to be less suitable for long storage durations, mainly due to self-discharge losses and economic feasibility. However, large-scale Li-ion battery ES applications are being increasingly deployed across the globe. The largescale deployment is mainly driven by their rapid reaction This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2025 Sustainable Energy Fuels,2025,9,5749–5771 | 5751 Review Sustainable Energy & Fuels Open Access Article. Published on 22 September 2025. Downloaded on 11/26/2025 8:25:49 AM. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. View Article Online
times, high conversion efficiencies (∼90%), scalability, and declining costs, making them highly suitable for discharge durations ranging from minutes up to around 10 hours in stationary applications. They can be situated both in grid and customer energy management applications encompassing a wide range of services. 18 Electrical ES technologies, such as Superconducting Magnetic Energy Storage (SMES) and Supercapacitors (SC), offer possibilities for transmission applications due to their quick response time (i.e., milliseconds) and high power density (i.e., SC =510–3300 W kg −1 whereas Li-ion =250–340 W kg −1 ), 19 supporting maintenance of power quality. 20 Noting that SCs are considered both as an electrochemical and electrical ES technology, they are emerging for use particularly in transmission grid services where very high power density is required for very short durations. SMES proves similar technical characteristics but has a limited application for providing ancillary and customer energy management services, since the high cost associated with the cooling efforts remain a drawback. 21 Thermal ES (TES) technologies, which are oen considered among the oldest forms of energy storage, include sensible, latent, and thermochemical heat storage. They can be applied across multiple scales –from industrial processes to private end-users –for the supply of thermal loads as well electricity generation in concentrated solar power (CSP) systems. TES systems are proven to effectively store heat with efficiencies up to 90%. However, the required storage duration and characteristics of the heat source are critical factors when choosing the Fig. 1 Technical properties and service applications of energy storage technologies. Actors indicated in brackets indicate that service can be partly provided/benefited by the named provider/beneficiary. (Based on data adapted from ref. 10 (CC BY 4.0)). 5752 |Sustainable Energy Fuels,2025,9,5749–5771 This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2025 Sustainable Energy & Fuels Review Open Access Article. Published on 22 September 2025. Downloaded on 11/26/2025 8:25:49 AM. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. View Article Online
type of storage media and conversion path, since heat losses show a large variety based on sensible, latent and thermochemical methods. Sensible TES is widely deployed as the most conventional approach, particularly using molten salts as the storage medium in CSP plants. Latent heat storage with Phase Changing Materials (PCMs) is an increasingly promising option offering higher heat capacity and lower thermal losses. PCMs are now oen applied either in combination with molten salts or as hybrid layers in CSP systems. Besides mature PCMs (salt hydrate or paraffins), many new materials and systems are under development. 19 Furthermore, these technologies offer potential for cross-sectoral ES services in a Power-to-Heat context (electricity, heating and cooling), depending on the required operational temperature range. 22 Beyond the individual use of the different storage technologies, there is increased exploration of hybrid ES concepts, with the expectations that the limitations of one ES technology are compensated by another (e.g., a combination of the extended lifespan and low cost of VRFBindex: VRFB\t: Vanadium Redox Flow Battery?> with the rapid response and high energy density of Li-ion batteries). 23 Such hybrid ES technologies might help to expand the range of services offered (i.e., service stacking) via improved performance. 24 In summary, ES technological choices necessitate thorough consideration of technological features and the performance of alternatives which fulll the requirements of the services within a certain application. Hence, a single technology-centered discussion is not useful, and different storage technologies complement each other in the energy system. The brief technical overview of the ES systems provided here should serve to build the links between the technologicaland applicationrelated aspects and sustainability. 4. Sustainability assessment of energy storage Sustainability assessments provide a critical foundation for arguments in ES decision-making. Their outcomes have the potential to inuence discussions on technological advancements, investment strategies and policymaking. However, the effectiveness of sustainability assessments can only be ensured if they are conducted comprehensively and produce robust and reliable results. Despite their signicance, sustainability assessments currently lack a standardized framework with clearly dened rules and assessment procedures. To some extent this is related to the individual design requirements of assessments in their specic context, which includes ES assessments. Several key principles have been developed to guide assessment processes, and ensure that assessments full their role. These key principles are outlined as a guiding vision, essential considerations, adequate scope, a well-structured framework with measurable indicators, transparency, effective communication, continuity and capacity, and active stakeholder participation, which are explained briey in the following. 25 A guiding vision refers to a long-term strategic framework that denes overarching goals, principles and desired outcomes serving as a normative reference point, such as the UN Sustainable Development Goals, or the energy transition in the ES context. Fig. 2 presents an overview of ES technologies and their role in the energy system, linking energy supply, energy demand, and sustainability assessment approaches considering energy transition as a guiding vision. Setting a guiding vision enables the denition of essential considerations, such as generation/demand relation, performance criteria, application requirements, available alternatives and their technical features, but also delivers transferrable inferences about economic, environmental and social system components and their interdependencies, as illustrated in Fig. 2. Furthermore, the links between the technical and sustainability spheres need to be built via consideration of current trends, drivers of change, risks, and uncertainties and activities which might cause cross-boundary impacts. The scope of ES sustainability assessments should describe how both shortand long-term effects of the decisions will be addressed considering spatial factors in the local and global context. Furthermore, a conceptual framework needs to be adopted or developed which incorporates and links the aforementioned aspects, which will then allow identication of indicators, data management strategy, scenario development and models. The most commonly used conceptual frameworks are Triple Bottom Line (TBL), UN Sustainability Development Goals (SDGs), Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment (LCSA), Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) Sustainability Reporting Framework, Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) Disclosure Frameworks (e.g., Sustainability Accounting Standards Boards, Integrated Reporting Framework), Sustainability Balanced Scorecard, Environmental and Social Impact Assessment (EIA/SIA) as well as Drivers-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR). 26–32 A comparative overview of the most widely applied sustainability conceptual frameworks is provided in Table 1, highlighting their distinctive focus, scope, and application with illustrative examples in the context of energy storage systems and technologies. The frameworks differ from one another based on the goal and scope of the assessment. For instance, LCSA quanties impacts throughout a product's lifetime, while EIA/SIA integrate sustainability considerations into project planning, and GRI or ESG frameworks strive for strategic alignment and transparency in the corporate world. For ES sustainability assessments the conceptual frameworks should provide guidance for identifying core indicators, target values and benchmarks, as well as data management strategies including the identication of reliable data sources and collection methods. Transparency and effective communication are continuous companions of sustainability assessments for both the users of the results and affected stakeholders. The stakeholders must be involved in both assessment study development and interpretation to ensure relevant indicators are chosen to address their needs accurately. Bearing in mind the assessment principles, one also needs to identify the values (subjective opinions, e.g., strong or weak sustainability) and sustainability principles (i.e., precautionary This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2025 Sustainable Energy Fuels,2025,9,5749–5771 | 5753 Review Sustainable Energy & Fuels Open Access Article. Published on 22 September 2025. Downloaded on 11/26/2025 8:25:49 AM. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. View Article Online
principle, irreversibility, regeneration, substitutability, critical loads etc.) for determining the approach to sustainability. 25 This then needs to be taken a step further, setting a decision context through the denition of the assessment object (i.e., policies/ measures, institutions, goods or services), which might inuence the relevant actors, scale, complexity, uncertainties, timing, impacts and strategies majorly. The core of a sustainability framework is methodological choice, which is inuenced by the given principles, approach, and decision context. This step includes identication of suitable assessment methodologies, methods, tools, and indicators, followed by uncertainty management. Since this review focuses on assessment methods, in the following subsections the applied methods in the literature on ES sustainability are systematically reviewed considering their economic, environmental and social dimensions. 205 studies are analyzed based on their technological focus, applied assessment methods and indicators, in order to explore the current assessment landscape. A methodological comparison is provided in SI Table 1, which organizes sustainability assessment methods into economic, environmental, and social dimensions, outlining their purposes, applications, strengths, limitations, and illustrative examples in the context of energy storage systems. For the detailed overview of the collected studies, used methods, and indicators, readers are asked to refer to the SI. 4.1. Economic assessment of energy storage The sustainability transformation of the global energy system depends on the availability and efficient use of nancial resources, which makes economics an essential pillar of sustainability. This transformation requires consideration of the internal costs of ES systems (i.e., expenses directly incurred by a business, individual, process of production or consumption), but also of the external costs (costs imposed on third parties or society) to mitigate adverse sustainability impacts. Therefore, an analysis of ES economics must account for perspectives beyond protability, considering external costs stemming from the environmental and social impacts born by other parties. Thus, it is crucial to conduct comprehensive economic assessments to provide a strong base of support for balanced decision-making which protects the interests of involved stakeholders. Conventionally, economics has been a determinant criterion for decisions, hence an extensive literature on the economic assessment of ES systems exists, with varying levels of granularity. An overview of the collected studies is provided in Fig. 3. Fig. 2 Introductory figure, overview of three main sustainability assessment dimensions and corresponding method selection for ES technologies. Notice, the battery is representative for all energy storage technologies. 5754 |Sustainable Energy Fuels,2025,9,5749–5771 This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2025 Sustainable Energy & Fuels Review Open Access Article. Published on 22 September 2025. Downloaded on 11/26/2025 8:25:49 AM. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. View Article Online
Bearing in mind the search string used to identify relevant studies, 14 were identied which solely apply economic assessments in the sustainability context, but this number increased to 90 when including studies which apply economic assessments in combination with other methods, or as parallel assessments. The heatmap provided in Fig. 3 shows the utilized economic indicators and assessment methods per ES technology, noting that an individual study may include multiple indicators, technologies and assessment methods. As can be observed, the vast majority of the collected studies focus on hydrogen and hydrogen-based renewable fuels, as well as Table 1 Comparison of key sustainability conceptual frameworks, highlighting their primary focus, scope, application levels, strengths, limitations, and illustrative examples in the context of energy storage systems and technologies Framework Primary focus Scope & coverage Level of application Strengths Limitations ES example TBL Balancing economic, environmental, and social dimensions Broad, qualitative Organizational, project, policy Simple, widely recognized, integrates three pillars of sustainability Lack of standardized metrics, risk of supercial adoption (“greenwashing”) Assessing battery manufacturing rms on protability, environmental footprint (e.g., emissions), and community wellbeing SDGs Global development priorities (17 goals, 169 targets) Global, crosssectoral National, organizational alignment Provides shared global agenda, widely endorsed, measurable targets High-level; may be difficult to operationalize at rm/project level Linking energy storage deployment to SDG 7 (affordable and clean energy) and SDG 13 (climate action) LCSA Holistic evaluation across life cycle (environmental, social, economic) Product/process oriented Operational, project, product design Comprehensive assessment; quantitative Data-intensive; methodological complexity LCA of Li-ion batteries, covering raw material extraction, production, use phase, and recycling GRI Standardized sustainability reporting Broad: economic, environmental and social disclosure Organizational (corporate reporting) Widely adopted, enhances the transparency and comparability Reporting burden, may encourage compliance over performance Annual sustainability reports of battery manufacturers detailing emissions, labor conditions, and community impacts ESG disclosure frameworks Investor-focused sustainability performance (environmental, social, governance) Financial materiality, risk, governance Organizational (primarily corporate/ nancial markets) Aligns sustainability with nancial markets; improves investor decisionmaking Narrower focus on nancial materiality; less attention to broader societal impacts ESG ratings of energy storage rms to assess investment risks (e.g., supply chain governance in cobalt sourcing) SBSC Integrates sustainability into strategic management and performance measurement Organizational strategy, KPIs Organizational (strategic planning and control) Links sustainability to business strategy; enables monitoring Organizationcentric; may overlook broader systemic issues Incorporating environmental KPIs into performance dashboards of gridscale storage companies EIA/SIA Anticipating and mitigating environmental and social impacts of projects Project-specic Project, infrastructure, development planning Legally mandated in many jurisdictions; preventive approach Oen reactive; scope may exclude longterm or cumulative impacts EIA/SIA for constructing largescale battery storage facilities assessing land use, emissions, and community acceptance DPSIR Causal framework for analyzing environmental and socio-economic interactions Environmental systems focus Policy and research (macro level) Useful for systemlevel analysis; policyrelevant Complexity; limited attention to economic/ organizational decision-making Modeling how demand for storage (driver) creates pressures on mining, alters environmental states, and elicits regulatory responses This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2025 Sustainable Energy Fuels,2025,9,5749–5771 | 5755 Review Sustainable Energy & Fuels Open Access Article. Published on 22 September 2025. Downloaded on 11/26/2025 8:25:49 AM. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. View Article Online
batteries. It can thus be seen that these areas dominate in line with current technological developments. The methodological approaches in the reviewed assessments predominantly employ Techno-economic Assessment/Analysis (TEA) and Life Cycle Costing (LCC) methods. The main reasons for this preference include ease of application, straightforward assessment procedures, data availability, the existence of supporting tools, and relatively low time requirements. However, the extent to which these advantages hold is largely determined by the depth of analysis undertaken in the study. TEA is not a standardized method, and multiple approaches exist. Techno-economic feasibility is oen assessed using engineering cost estimation and analogy-based approaches, with a focus on Capital Expenditure (CAPEX) and Operational Expenditures (OPEX). CAPEX typically encompasses direct, indirect, xed, and working capital costs, while OPEX covers xed and variable costs, including powerand energy-capacity-related operation and maintenance (O&M) expenses. 19 Estimating CAPEX and OPEX is essential for understanding the cost structure of ES systems and must be contextualized with respect to technological specications and application requirements. These steps are frequently the most time-consuming and data-intensive, owing to incomplete information, limited vendor input, or a lack of applicationspecic data. Given the importance of CAPEX and OPEX, the economic model must accurately capture the relationship between technological performance and operational parameters. Hence, as shown in Fig. 3, Levelized Cost of X (LCOX) is the most frequently used indicator which incorporates the aforementioned aspects in TEAs to analyze overall cost per unit of energy delivered over lifetime (e.g., levelized cost of electricity, levelized cost of hydrogen, levelized cost of heat) in aggregated terms. It allows comparisons and benchmarking of technologies under identical operational conditions and/or application based on the same energy vector. 33 Classically, TEAs use the Fig. 3 Applied economic assessment methods (n=90) across various energy storage technologies. The heatmap presents the frequency of occurrence of the top 10 most frequently used economic assessment indicators for different energy storage technologies. The color gradient represents the frequency of occurrence, with green indicating higher frequency and red indicating lower frequency. Note that an individual study may include multiple indicators, technologies and assessment methods. 5756 |Sustainable Energy Fuels,2025,9,5749–5771 This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2025 Sustainable Energy & Fuels Review Open Access Article. Published on 22 September 2025. Downloaded on 11/26/2025 8:25:49 AM. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. View Article Online
levelized cost approach with a strong focus on internal costs, excluding internalization of the external costs. Due to the increasing prominence of climate change, some studies incorporate costs like greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and carbon abatement cost (see Fig. 3). Considering the studies identied, indicators that account for external costs remain underutilized. This is particularly so for external environmental and social costs. Furthermore, a key observation is the insufficient focus on the end-of-life (EoL) phase when considering life cycle stages. In most cases, this phase is limited to dismantling and disposal, and oen overlooks the impacts of recycling raw materials. Additionally, a set of studies use classic dynamic investment calculation-based indicators such as Net Present Value (NPV) (n =21), annuity, and Internal Rate of Return (IRR) (n=17) in static or dynamic models to aggregate those parameters over the system's lifetime considering the time value of money. Payback Period (PBP) is another indicator that is widely considered for hydrogen/hydrogen-based renewable fuels since the CAPEX required for the fuel production, supply, and utilization infrastructure requires high initial investment costs. Moreover, Minimum Selling Price (MSP) and Total Production Cost (TPC) are frequently used in assessments of hydrogen/hydrogenbased renewable fuels. Such indicators are oen selected for specic technologies because they provide a convenient basis for comparison and benchmarking within the same category. However, this approach limits comparability with other types of technologies that may provide similar services (see Fig. 3). Hydrogen-based fuels are also generally regarded as expensive alternatives under current fuel price benchmarks. Hence MSP and TPC are also applied for comparison with fossil-based options. Nevertheless, as these indicators do not capture the downstream utilization of such fuels, they offer only limited comparability, for instance in the decision-making context when used as the only economic KPI. LCC is identied as the second most widely-applied approach for economic assessments, predominantly applied to batteries and hydrogen/-based ES. This is likely due to the rapid emergence of these technologies and the signicance of their lifecycle stages. Moreover, LCC is oen preferred due to its practicality in leveraging Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) models. LCC refers to the total cost of ownership (TCO), by including costs from raw materials or acquisition to EoL. Generally, it is widely used for estimating the total cost of a system, product, service or infrastructure for decision-making on long-term investments. Although it shares similarities with TEA, its distinct feature lies in the more detailed integration of life cycle thinking. Unlike levelized cost, LCC incorporates the ideal costs of each life cycle stage, including replacements, disposal and recycling. Among the considered studies, LCC is commonly applied to batteries since the life cycle-oriented approach allows the incorporation of costs associated with raw materials and manufacturing, but also incorporates technical performance criteria such as capacity fade, cycle degradation and system lifespan for the use phase. Under identical operational conditions, LCC enables a fair comparison of different batteries to assist decisions in technological choices. Furthermore, variations of LCC, such as environmental LCC (E-LCC), full environmental LCC (FE-LCC), and societal LCC (S-LCC), internalize environmental and social costs using monetization to approximate the actual total cost. 34 However, these variations of LCC are not applied very frequently within the collected studies in the ES context. These variations are useful for capturing the full spectrum of actual costs. However, they require a more complex approach, since monetary valuation relies on detailed life cycle inventory data, and many environmental and social impacts lack standardized high quality or region-specic datasets. The lack of universally agreed monetization frameworks also makes the results less comparable and sometimes disputed. Other, less frequently used methods are Socio-economic Assessment (SEA) including scal analysis, Input/Output Method (or Multi-regional Input-Output MRIO), cost-benet analysis, and risk-benet analysis. These evaluate the economic feasibility and societal benets of ES projects considering different perspectives (manufacturer, customer or society). 35 However, none of these methods were captured in the literature search for ES systems. These methods are oen not employed because most studies adopt a sector-oriented perspective rather than productor service-specic micro-level assessments. The prevailing motivation is typically casespecic feasibility in the collected studies, rather than evaluating cumulative sectoral impacts. Considering the methods presented here, it is evident that the necessary methods to thoroughly analyze the economics of ES systems exist and are well-developed, if not utilized to their full extent. Based on the observations derived from the analysis, the following general and specic recommendations are made to enhance economic assessments of ES systems: (i) Granularity: enhance the level of detail and granularity in economic assessments by improving data quality and availability, while balancing this against practical constraints such as time and resource expenditure. The value of higher-resolution input data has been shown in studies of battery ES in power markets, where revenue and cost outcomes differed substantially when individual services such as frequency regulation, reserve capacity, and voltage support were considered separately. 36 Similarly, research on vehicle-togrid applications has demonstrated that using real-world duty cycle data revealed degradation and economic values which were not captured by aggregated proles. 37 (ii) Case specic considerations: selection of assessment methods that enable incorporation of economic aspects related to the specic market region, regulatory framework, and ownership model of the ES project, as these signicantly inuence feasibility and interdependent sustainability aspects. For example, LCC of thermal ES systems showed that economic feasibility depends strongly on regional market rules and service remuneration schemes. 38 Similarly, hybrid battery– fuel-cell system assessments highlighted the role of local policy and ownership structures in shaping outcomes. 39 The decarbonization of shipping through alternative fuels further illustrates how regulatory frameworks, such as the IMO's emission targets, directly condition economic feasibility. 40 This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2025 Sustainable Energy Fuels,2025,9,5749–5771 | 5757 Review Sustainable Energy & Fuels Open Access Article. Published on 22 September 2025. Downloaded on 11/26/2025 8:25:49 AM. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. View Article Online
used in each database. In SHDB, characterization factors are expressed as qualitative risk levels (e.g., low, medium, high, very high) at the country–sector level, indicating the likelihood of a social issue occurring but not its magnitude. By contrast, PSILCA employs quantitative characterization factors linked to activity variables such as working hours, value added, or number of employees, allowing social impacts to be expressed in measurable units (e.g., hours of child labor per functional unit). This makes SHDB particularly useful for hotspot identi- cation, whereas PSILCA supports more detailed and comparable quantication of social impacts. Beyond S-LCA, other methods such as Social Footprint/Social Handprint, Social Impact Assessment (SIA), Social Return on Investment (SROI), acceptability studies, and Socio-Economic Impact Assessment (SEIA) are used for social assessments. However, these methods are not captured in this review by the formulated search string, since they have a corporate-, sector-, or country-oriented perspective rather than focusing directly on ES technology in the application context. A brief introduction to these methods is provided in the SI. Even though technology acceptance is not part of the aforementioned social assessment methods, on the social dimension, technology acceptance is a very relevant aspect, which can directly affect the realization of an ES project. The public behavioral responses, including those from pressure groups, can signicantly impact the success of ES projects. This is particularly relevant for technologies with direct public visibility, such as large storage units, where concerns may arise regarding visual impacts, perceived health and safety risks, and broader sustainability implications (e.g.,reected in initiatives like the battery passport). 100 Despite its importance, technology acceptance remains a eld without a universally agreed denition. Many studies equate acceptance with attitudes, simultaneously considering both attitudinal and behavioral dimensions. 101 In a technological context, acceptance can be understood as an attitude towards technology, which may manifest in behaviors which either support or oppose specic proposals. Research in this eld typically relies on interviews and surveys, demanding a high level of expertise in their design and evaluation. In technology acceptance studies, reliance on interviewand survey-based data presents an additional challenge: the insights are oen highly context-specic, shaped by cultural, social, and regional conditions, and thus not easily transferable to other cases. This limits the availability of processable data for broader assessments of social acceptance of ES technologies. Possible solutions include the development of harmonized survey instruments, cross-country comparative studies, and integration of such primary data into open-access databases to enable more consistent and comparable evaluation of ES technology acceptance across different settings. Understanding technology acceptability is crucial for practitioners, policymakers, and decision-makers, as insights into public perceptions can guide more informed decisions and facilitate the successful adoption of ES technologies within the broader framework of sustainable development initiatives. (i) Our analysis demonstrates that S-LCA is the most frequently used method for assessing the social impacts of ES systems. Given the critical role of social aspects in sustainability, there is a growing demand for more comprehensive assessments. The concentration of studies on batteries and hydrogen highlights a research gap: other ES technologies (e.g., mechanical storage, thermal storage, or other power-to-X pathways) remain underexplored, particularly within social assessments. Broadening the scope of future assessments to these technologies would provide decision-makers with a more balanced evidence base to identify the most appropriate solutions under specic regional boundary conditions. Many of the general recommendations given in the previous sections also apply to social assessments of ES technologies, for example, the importance of a clear goal and scope denition, comprehensive system boundaries, robust data management, consideration of use phase, use of consistent functional units, and the integration of sensitivity and uncertainty analyses. Considering the available methods, the following additional recommendations need to be considered when addressing the social dimension of ES sustainability: stakeholders: integration of stakeholder participation into the assessment process to capture diverse social perspectives and increase the legitimacy and relevance of the ndings. Social impacts of ES technologies are oen highly contextdependent, shaped by local communities, workers, supply chain actors, and policy frameworks. Early and active involvement of these groups (through e.g., co-construction, participatory workshops, or structured interviews) helps to ensure that the assessment addresses issues of real concern and presents results in a form useful for decision-making. Such participation not only enhances transparency and acceptance of the study but also reduces the risk of overlooking vulnerable groups or regionspecic concerns that may otherwise remain hidden. (ii) Extending the technological scope: encourage the application of S-LCA beyond currently dominant technologies to ensure a more balanced representation of social impacts across the ES landscape. The present concentration of studies on a few technologies leaves gaps in understanding the social implications of other ES alternatives. Broadening the scope of social assessments would provide decision-makers with a more comprehensive evidence base. (iii) Mixed methods: develop and apply more comprehensive and consistent frameworks, incorporating both qualitative and quantitative indicators to improve comparability and robustness. While qualitative approaches such as interviews and surveys capture context-specic insights and stakeholder perceptions, quantitative databases (e.g., SHDB or PSILCA) provide structured, process-level information. Combining these approaches allows studies to benet from the methodological strength of each, where qualitative methods add depth, nuance, and legitimacy, and quantitative methods ensure consistency, scalability, and comparability across technologies and regions. Leveraging the methodological capacities of complementary approaches (see SI) can thus enhance the overall reliability and decision-usefulness of social assessments of ES technologies. 5764 |Sustainable Energy Fuels,2025,9,5749–5771 This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2025 Sustainable Energy & Fuels Review Open Access Article. Published on 22 September 2025. Downloaded on 11/26/2025 8:25:49 AM. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. View Article Online
(iv) Comprehensive database: strengthen the level of detail in modelling supply chains, especially for raw materials and component manufacturing, by improving access to and use of dedicated social impact databases. This recommendation is directed primarily at tool and database developers, who should aim to improve the representativeness and transparency of the datasets underlying social assessment tools. However, practitioners must also be aware of the limitations of available data in the specic context of their study. While average processes and proxy data can be useful for approximating real-world conditions, their limitations in representing actual social dynamics need to be clearly acknowledged and discussed. Making these constraints explicit helps to avoid overinterpretation of results and ensures that conclusions remain credible for decision-making. (v) Interdimensional relations: utilize existing economic and environmental life cycle data and models, which might be helpful in enhancing the coverage and depth of social assessments, especially in cases of data scarcity or high uncertainty. Since many processes and supply chains are already wellcharacterized in environmental LCA and techno-economic analyses, these datasets can serve as valuable proxies or structural references to identify relevant actors, hotspots, and impact pathways in social LCA. Integrating such interdimensional information can help to streamline data collection, improve the completeness of system modelling, and enable more consistent comparisons across the three sustainability dimensions. Care must be taken, however, to ensure methodological coherence and avoid overextending assumptions beyond their intended scope. (vi) Supply chain transparency: promote greater transparency from industry actors regarding labor conditions, sourcing practices, and governance measures, as such disclosures are essential for accurate social impact analysis. Similar to the point on data representativeness, this recommendation is directed at data providers, who are oen also among the key stakeholder groups involved. A clear understanding of supply chains is crucial because social impacts are not only sector-specic but are also strongly shaped by regional conditions. Improved traceability of supply chains allows assessment practitioners to identify the relevant stakeholder more accurately, which in turn enhances the validity and contextual relevance of the assessment results. (vii) Observing dynamic conditions: be aware of the contextdependent and dynamic nature of social data in S-LCA. Social impacts are strongly inuenced by temporal and regional factors such as changes in labor regulations, governance quality, market dynamics and cultural norms. As a result, data that are accurate at one point in time or in one location may quickly become outdated or unrepresentative elsewhere. Practitioners should therefore treat social data as timeand context-sensitive, complementing them with regular updates, scenario analyses, or sensitivity testing to capture possible changes over time. Recognizing this dynamic character helps to avoid misleading conclusions and strengthens the robustness of social assessments of ES technologies. 5. Integrated sustainability assessments Given the multidimensional character of sustainability, assessments limited to a single dimension are insufficient to support informed decision-making in the context of ES systems. While a range of ES technologies exists to meet the service demands of diverse applications, no single technology can universally satisfy all application-specic requirements. As highlighted above, the interdependencies of technical, economic, environmental and social dimensions are crucial for decisions. Improvement in one dimension can result in unintended impacts in another, also known as burden shiing. 102 Oen a trade-offmust be found and minimized between different criteria, which can be done with the aid of integrated sustainability assessment methods with active involvement of stakeholders. In practice, integrated assessments employ analytical methods which correspond to each sustainability dimension. However, they vary in how these methods are combined and integrated within the overall assessment framework. Side-by-side assessment results must be used for decision-making to identify the trade-offsvia decision analysis methods. In these assessments, interpretation and communication of the results show variation and should always acknowledge the signicance of decision attributes and objectives. The conducted literature review identies 76 studies which consider both environmental and economic assessments, whereas only one study assesses social and environmental dimensions, as illustrated in Fig. 6. Since the primary aim of the conducted literature review was to investigate the assessment methods applied in the eld of ES systems, the search string did not yield a broad range of studies employing integrated assessments, and in particular, those covering all three dimensions of sustainability within the ES context. The limited Fig. 6 Considered studies, distribution of focused sustainability dimensions. This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2025 Sustainable Energy Fuels,2025,9,5749–5771 | 5765 Review Sustainable Energy & Fuels Open Access Article. Published on 22 September 2025. Downloaded on 11/26/2025 8:25:49 AM. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. View Article Online
number of integrated assessments can be attributed to the complexity and resource intensity of conducting such studies. Performing even a single type of high quality assessment (economic, environmental, or social) is already time-consuming and costly. One important and critical observation is that assessment studies which address multiple sustainability dimensions oen conduct these evaluations independently, rather than employing side-by-side assessments. As a result, methodological integration across dimensions is typically omitted, limiting the coherence and comparability of the ndings. Combining all three dimensions requires interdisciplinary collaboration, large datasets, and extended study lengths, which may exceed the practical scope of conventional research projects and publication formats. Nevertheless, highlighting this gap is important, as decision-makers ultimately need more holistic insights. Stepwise or modular integration of the three dimensions, or coordinated multi-institutional efforts, may provide a more feasible path forward. For the sake of completeness and to promote integrated assessments, herein integration methods are introduced. To the authors' best knowledge, the Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment (LCSA) framework and Extended Multi-Regional Input-Output Analysis (EMRIO) are the potentially applicable approaches in ES sustainability assessments, oen supported by Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA) to facilitate decision-making across sustainability dimensions. LCSA is a comprehensive framework that considers the environmental, economic, and social dimensions of a product, process, or service. 103 LCA, LCC, and S-LCA methods are all integrated under a unied goal and scope denition, ideally incorporating stakeholder perspectives. 104–107 Additionally, the integration of circular economy principles and material criticality into the LCSA framework has been recently recognized as crucial, considering resource efficiency concerns, growing global supply chain risks and import reliance. 108 While LCSA serves as an indicative approach for decision-making, its full potential can only be realized through comprehensive system boundary denitions and data harmonization. 109 This is particularly relevant for ES systems, where variations in supply chains and regional energy mixes can signicantly impact sustainability performance. It adheres to the conventional LCA framework but includes a concluding step which presents aggregated scores for decision-making. In LCSA, the quality of assessment results and decision-making setup in terms of stakeholder consolidation play a major role. Each assessment must entail all relevant life cycle phases and stakeholder perspectives, particularly the EoL, potentially changing the overall picture regarding environmental impacts and resource use. MCDA is a structured approach used to address decisionmaking problems involving multiple criteria, stakeholders, and potential alternatives by their weighting and ranking. In the ES sustainability assessment context, MCDA is helpful for comparison of specic technology alternatives, in particular through the use of Multi-attribute Decision Making (MADMindex: MADM\t: multi-attribute decision-making?>) methods (here MCDA is used as a synonym) which is oen used for decision-making analysis in LCSAs. Use of multi-objective decision-making can also be relevant, but is not considered within the scope of this review. MCDA is carried out in two overlapping phases: construction and exploitation. The construction phase covers goal, scope and alternatives denition, identication and selection of criteria, selection of MADM methods, and stakeholder interface creation. The exploitation phase involves criteria performance measurements, weights elicitation, criteria aggregation, and results comparison. This can be done using several methods, such as compensatory (e.g., analytic hierarchy process (AHP)) or outranking methods such as the preference ranking organization method for enrichment evaluation (PROMETHEE). 110,111 These methods allow for comprehensive and iterative engagement of stakeholders. 112 In any case, an MCDA must be carried out in a careful way to assure the comparability of alternatives and avoid non-practical applications without a real-world context. 113 On a broader scope, EMRIO incorporates environmental, socio-economic, and social account indicators into the input– output matrix in contrast to MRIO which has a focus on economic ows. 114 This allows the simultaneous assessment of various sustainability indicators related to the sectoral economic activities in macro-economic terms. Common indicators include socio-economic indicators as value-added and employment generation, while environmental indicators entail global warming impacts, with the possibility to use other impact categories (e.g., terrestrial/freshwater acidication, eutrophication, land use). 114–116 Social indicators considered can be both qualitative and quantitative. 117 Others have used EMRIO to analyze dependence and governance, assessing risks associated with a diversied portfolio of suppliers from countries with various governance levels. 115,116 In sum, EMRIO can be used for macro-level assessments and for investigating multiplier, spill-over and feedback effects. 118 It is critical for all assessment and decision-making steps to incorporate relevant stakeholder perspectives in order to ensure the representativeness of the study. However, stakeholder preferences depend strongly on aspects such as spatial factors and participant type; hence, they may have limited temporal validity as they can change over time. Here, workshops integrating industry representatives, policymakers and communities can help to discuss results and obtain further input. This may result in conicting outcomes, which complicates the provision of a comprehensive picture and clear recommendations. However, this complexity is inherent in all decisions, and consulting all stakeholder groups improves the accuracy of trade-offs for a comprehensive picture on which a robust decision is built. 6. Conclusions Through the conducted literature review, this work shows that all necessary methodological tools are available to address ES sustainability holistically across environmental, economic, and social dimensions. However, these methods are not used to their full extent, and fail to exploit their full capacity for delivering directive inferences. This is mainly due to the way ES 5766 |Sustainable Energy Fuels,2025,9,5749–5771 This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2025 Sustainable Energy & Fuels Review Open Access Article. Published on 22 September 2025. Downloaded on 11/26/2025 8:25:49 AM. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. View Article Online
assessment studies are designed, oen with a narrow scope aimed at clarifying doubts in a single dimension, while neglecting other aspects that may be critical for decisionmaking. In order to advance the discourse on the sustainability of ES systems and facilitate informed decision-making, comprehensive and multidimensional assessments are essential. Despite the availability of appropriate methods, several constraints hinder their comprehensive application, including the absence of a universal assessment framework, disparities in methodological maturity, limitations in data availability, and the high modelling efforts required. While economic assessment methods have traditionally been considered the most established, environmental methods such as LCA and MFA have reached a comparable level of development, owing to recent advancements in measurement and estimation techniques. In the social dimension, despite the lack of methodological plenitude, notable progress has been made in recent years. Qualitative methods have increasingly been complemented by quantitative analyses, and the development of social impact databases has played a crucial role. This observation is further supported by the current, but still limited, application of S-LCA in the ES context. Furthermore, a critical observation from the literature is that most existing assessments prioritize highly debated aspects, particularly environmental or economic aspects, rather than embracing sustainability as a whole. The prevailing objective is oen to evaluate a specic technological choice in order to demonstrate environmental sustainability (mostly focusing on climate change impacts) at an acceptable cost. This approach oen results in the exclusion of the social dimension and an insufficient consideration of interdependencies between dimensions, which weakens the comprehensiveness of the sustainability argument. Although it is encouraging that environmental and economic aspects are increasingly assessed together, many of these studies lack a guiding framework capable of steering the ndings toward robust and integrated decisions. Surprisingly, none of the studies evaluate social and economic dimensions together, even though these two dimensions are strongly interconnected since both S-LCA and SIA methods have a strong economic orientation. To move towards embracing sustainability as a whole in a more quantitative manner, future studies could adopt hybrid frameworks that combine environmental LCA, LCC, and S-LCA into LCSA as introduced in Section 5. Quantitative integration can be supported through MCDA, which allows weighting and aggregation of indicators across dimensions, or by employing common reference units such as ‘sustainability scores’ normalized per functional unit. While each of these approaches comes with methodological challenges, their application would help to explicitly consider interdependencies. Given the considerable time and collaborative effort required to conduct fully integrated studies, side-by-side assessments can serve as a pragmatic alternative for managing workload, provided that they adopt consistent goal and scope denitions, system boundaries, and functional units. This consistency enables meaningful comparison and alignment of results across the different sustainability dimensions. It is evident that environmental impacts are frequently assessed in combination with techno-economic feasibility, reecting a tendency toward partial integration. While feasibility studies were historically evaluated solely in technoeconomic terms, and sustainability was primarily framed in environmental contexts, this shiin approach points to a recognition. While the lack of social assessments is not the sole obstacle to integrated sustainability evaluations, it does remain a critical gap. Cases such as lead-acid batteries, which are environmentally competitive for certain applications due to high recyclability but raise severe social health concerns from mining and informal recycling, or Li-ion batteries, where child labor risks in cobalt supply chains undermine otherwise favorable environmental assessments, illustrate how social aspects can overturn or fundamentally qualify conclusions derived from environmental or economic analysis alone. As underlined by the TBL framework, consistent accounting of all dimensions is the key to sustainability. In the near future, regulatory mechanisms such as ESG are expected to contribute more substantially to establishing this balance. By providing standardized social indicators and evaluation structures, ESG frameworks can stimulate an increase in social impact analyses and support the integration of the social dimension into sustainability assessments. In terms of technological scope of the assessments, battery and hydrogen-based systems are the most frequently assessed ES technologies. This trend corresponds with the increasing attention these technologies receive due to their critical role in the energy transition. A signicant share of the studies focused on understanding the environmental and economic impacts of these systems. The recommendations need to be taken into consideration to improve the quality of these assessments. Achieving high quality assessments is essential for their efficient use in decision-making, which requires additional efforts for the realization of stronger collaboration between regulatory bodies and academic institutions. This cooperation should potentially contribute to the promotion of more transparent, accessible, and complete data generation practices. Furthermore, it is vital to incorporate interdisciplinary perspectives into study designs in order to close existing knowledge gaps and generate assessment-based evidence to support complex decisions. To this end, structured stakeholder engagement frameworks must be employed to ensure that the perspectives of policymakers, researchers, industry actors, and society at large are adequately represented. On the policy and regulatory side, recommendations should focus on establishing comprehensive sustainability assessment frameworks for ES systems, with clearly dened operational steps, standardized indicators, and transparent estimation methods. Finally, it is important to recognize that sustainability assessments in this eld remain largely technology-centric, with limited attention given to system-level perspectives that consider deployment strategies and their broader socioeconomic and environmental implications. Expanding the analytical focus beyond individual technologies to the wider This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2025 Sustainable Energy Fuels,2025,9,5749–5771 | 5767 Review Sustainable Energy & Fuels Open Access Article. Published on 22 September 2025. Downloaded on 11/26/2025 8:25:49 AM. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. View Article Online
system context will be essential to enhance the relevance, credibility, and utility of sustainability assessments moving forward. Author contributions Conceptualization and methodology: Hüseyin Ersoy, Manuel Baumann, Merve Erakca, Friedrich Jasper, Marco Ferraro, Viera Pechancov´ a, Patrick Stuhm, Maurizio Cellura, Sonia Longo, Manfredi Picciotto Maniscalco, Roland Hischier, Chiara Busto, Alessandra Tacca, Sebastian Dickler, Petra Zapp, Christina Wulf, Yolanda Lechon, Martina Haase, Marcel Weil, Tom´ as B. Ramos, and Stefano Passerini. Investigation: Hüseyin Ersoy, Manuel Baumann, Tom´ as B. Ramos, and Marcel Weil. Data Curation: Hüseyin Ersoy. Formal Analysis: Hüseyin Ersoy and Manuel Baumann. Visualization: Merve Erakca and Hüseyin Ersoy. Writing –original Dra: Hüseyin Ersoy, Manuel Baumann, and all co-authors. Writing –review & editing: Hüseyin Ersoy, Manuel Baumann, Marcel Weil, Tom´ as B. Ramos, and Friedrich Jasper. Supervision: Stefano Passerini, Tom´ as B. Ramos, Marcel Weil, and Manuel Baumann. Conflicts of interest There are no conicts to declare. Data availability All data supporting the ndings of this study are available within the article and its SI les. As this is a review article, no new experimental or computational data were generated. The datasets analyzed in the course of the review were obtained from publicly available peer-reviewed literature, and all sources are fully cited. Should any additional information be required, the corresponding author is available for inquiries. Supplementary information: (1) a PDF (“Supplementary Information: Assessment Method Comparison and Additional Methods for Social Assessment of Energy Storage”) containing Supplementary Table 1—taxonomy of sustainability assessment methods categorized by their primary focus (economic, environmental, social) with illustrative energy sector applications—and a chapter summarizing additional social assessment methods not introduced in the main manuscript; and (2) an Excel le with six tables: SI-Table 1 (raw collection of studies for the literature review), SI-Table 2 (selected and ltered studies), SITable 3 (main technology groups and clustured specic energy storage technologies), SI-Table 4 (applied economic and social assessments grouped by technology), SI-Table 5 (applied environmental assessments grouped by technology), and SI-Table 6 (applied environmental and social assessments grouped by technology). See DOI: https://doi.org/10.1039/d5se00750j. Acknowledgements All authors acknowledge the support of the European Commission under the project StoRIES within the Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme under Grant Agreement No. 101036910. Viera Pechancov´ a, Manuel Baumann and Hüseyin Ersoy acknowledges received support under TwinVECTOR project within the Horizon Europe under Grant Agreement No. 101078935. Marcel Weil and Friedrich Jasper would like to thank the Cluster of Excellence POLiS (which is funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) under Project ID 390874152). 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