redox-flow batteries

The US Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory has made a third semi-exclusive commercial license for vanadium redox flow battery technologies, in order to help bring the technology to market.

Underwriters Laboratories, a US non-profit standards development organization, will carry out research into the operating and safety profile of Redflow’s redox flow batteries under nominal and off-nominal conditions.

Conceived for the storage of residential and large scale renewable energy, the device has a rated power of over 150mW/cm², an energy density exceeding 40Wh/L, and a power density of 72.5mW/cm². The battery was built with an anode made of inexpensive viologen and its cost, according to its creators, may be lower than $100/kWh.

Canadian companies Invinity and Elemental Energy are planning to couple a 21 MW solar plant under development in Alberta with 8.4 MWh of vanadium redox flow battery storage capacity.

SDG&E and Sumitomo Electric complete a pilot microgrid project in California that successfully powered utility customers solely with energy stored in a flow battery.

Researchers in Portugal have tested how vanadium redox flow batteries can be integrated with rooftop PV to balance the system load to ensure firm power output. They proposed a 5 kW/60 kWh battery configuration for a 6.7 kW building-integrated PV microgrid. According to their findings, the battery can be used in different energy management strategy scenarios to better complement solar photovoltaic generation.

The device was designed by scientists in Portugal to optimize light absorption by the semiconductor and ensure an effective diffusion of redox species while offering minimal electronic and ionic transport resistance. The cell has a 25cm² photoactive area and relies on ferrocyanide/anthraquinone redox flow chemistry and a nanostructured hematite photoelectrode.

Canada-based Elcora said the transaction will enhance its mining operations and energy storage business.

Australian energy storage company VSUN Energy claims to have identified the ‘missing piece of the renewable energy jigsaw’ after successfully testing a standalone electric vehicle battery charger using solar PV supplied by a vanadium redox flow battery.

The battery was fabricated by Chinese scientists with a low-cost electrolyte made of a derivative of TEMPO, which is a well-known electroactive aminoxyl radical used with several applications in chemistry and biochemistry. According to the researchers, the battery shows high redox potential and is crossover-free.