The project, which was revealed by Grenergy in November 2023, will pair 1GW of solar PV with 4.1GWh of energy storage, which the company said makes it the largest energy storage projects in the world.

“The agreement with a leading company like BYD demonstrates our firm commitment to energy storage and represents a major step forward in securing the supply needed to be able to develop and build the battery projects we have recently announced,” said David Ruiz de Andrés, CEO of Grenergy.

The company has not given a clear timeline on when the Oasis de Atacama project will reach full operational capacity.

BYD is primarily an electric vehicle (EV) manufacturer but has expanded into the battery energy storage system (BESS) market too. It recently overtook Tesla for EV sales, making it the world’s largest while recent research from Wood Mackenzie as joint fourth-largest (with Huawei) BESS supplier globally in 2022.

Chile is by far the busiest energy storage market in Latin America and one of the most active in the world as the country looks to integrate vast quantities of intermittent solar PV generation, with the Atacama desert often called the ‘sunniest place in the world’.

Massive amounts of solar curtailment are leading IPPs to add storage to existing solar projects while a new regulation allowing standalone storage to participate in the electricity market has opened that segment up too. Chile also has huge lithium reserves which the state recently moved to gain control over.

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Liu also confirmed the deal is only for cells and not modules, racks or enclosures. Powin has its own proprietary modular battery energy storage system (BESS) unit, the Stack750E, part of its Centipede platform for grid-scale energy storage applications.

The agreement follows supply deals announced by Powin in 2023 including a 3GWh deal with Rept and a 10GWh deal with Eve Energy, both also China-based.

LFP cells have become the industry standard for BESS projects with a lower cost than nickel manganese cobalt (NMC), and its lower energy density than NMC is less of an issue in the BESS space than it is in the EV market.

Powin is headquartered in Oregon, US, and is active in the US market but has a substantial foothold in the Asia-Pacific region. It is building one of the world’s biggest single-phase BESS projects in Australia, the 1.68GWh Waratah Super Battery, and is also active in Taiwan.

Energy storage projects in the US are increasingly looking to secure future US-made battery supply (there is negligible capacity currently) to qualify for a 10% ‘domestic content’ uplift to the investment tax credit (ITC) for clean energy projects.

Hithium is one of the only large-scale lithium-ion OEMs (original equipment manufacturer) that is solely focused on the energy storage market, and is targeting 135GWh of production capacity by 2025. Last year it signed supply deals with US developer Perfect Power and system integrator Flexgen.

The firm’s 300Ah cells have a 12,000 cycle lifetime with a 2% maximum ageing effect over the first thousand cycles versus the industry standard of 6%, it claimed.

Powin VP global procurement Jason Eschenbrenner said: “It’s great to have Hithium on board as a supplier to support our rapid implementation of large-scale energy storage projects. Particularly when it comes to extending projects’ lifespan, their 300Ah cell provides us with an exceptionally reliable, long-lasting building block.”

Energy-Storage.news’ publisher Solar Media will host the 5th Energy Storage Summit USA, 19-20 March 2024 in Austin, Texas. Featuring a packed programme of panels, presentations and fireside chats from industry leaders focusing on accelerating the market for energy storage across the country. For more information, go to the website.

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The equipment is made in the US and as such expected to allow both manufacturer and customers to benefit from Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) incentives for domestically-made clean energy equipment. They will be kitted out with cells made by KORE Power, which is currently building a factory in Arizona set to open this year, with an annual production capacity of 6GWh.

That plant can ramp to 12GWh annual production, while KORE Power also has a factory in China with 6GWh annual production. KORE Power has received an offer of financial support to the tune of US$850 million from the US government towards its manufacturing plans, from the Department of Energy’s Loan Programs Office (LPO).  

The KORE Power DC Blocks include purpose-built enclosures, which are proprietary to the company’s design; a battery management system (BMS); high voltage alternating current (HVAC) equipment and fire suppression systems, in addition to other safety features. While designed for DC-coupled applications, the solutions can also be used in turnkey AC-coupled projects.

The company claimed that an unspecified volume of orders have already been received “from multiple customers”.

In September 2023, KORE Power, which also has a system integration arm and a stake in mobile BESS provider Nomad, signed deal with the US division of Japan’s Nidec, through which Nidec would buy up to 2.2GWh of cells from the manufacturer. Alongside that supply deal is a technology transfer partnership, with KORE Power DC Blocks to be integrated into utility-scale and commercial and industrial (C&I) BESS with Nidec’s power conversion system (PCS) technology.

While the IRA has ushered in a huge wave of investment and interest in the US clean energy sectors, KORE Power was somewhat ahead of the curve in seeking to develop lithium battery manufacturing to the BESS industry, starting from the ground up with cell production.

In a June 2021 online roundtable event chaired by US Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, KORE Power CEO Lindsay Gorrill said that cells, are the “fundamental basic unit” of BESS and electric vehicle (EV) technologies and the “critical piece” into which he urged the country to encourage investment into.

Energy-Storage.news’ publisher Solar Media will host the 6th Energy Storage Summit USA, 19-20 March 2024 in Austin, Texas. Featuring a packed programme of panels, presentations and fireside chats from industry leaders focusing on accelerating the market for energy storage across the country. For more information, go to the website.

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The electrolyte is a key material in the making of vanadium redox flow batteries (VRFBs), which store the liquid in tanks separate to the cathode and anode stack of the battery.

That means the energy capacity of a VRFB can be scaled up merely by increasing the size of the tank, as opposed to lithium-ion batteries, where additional stacks are required to create larger capacities. The technology is considered a contender for providing long-duration energy storage (LDES) at scale, and among its advantages are expected long lifetimes through thousands of heavy cycles.

The new electrolyte plant in Wangara, WA, will convert high-purity vanadium pentoxide into vanadium electrolyte. Its initial production capacity has not been revealed, but AVL aims to ramp it up to 33MWh of annual production. The plant’s construction was completed late last year, as reported by Energy-Storage.news in mid-December.

AVL is a vanadium resource company listed on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) and seeking to develop vertically integrated capabilities along the entire vanadium value chain.

That includes a primary vanadium extraction site it hopes to open in WA which could potentially produce amounts equivalent to about 5% of today’s entire global supply, as well as a processing plant to turn raw vanadium into the high-purity vanadium pentoxide required.

AVL also has a downstream arm to promote VRFB systems into Australian and overseas markets.

As AVL marketing manager Samantha McGahan wrote in a Guest Blog for this site last year, access to electrolyte is what will really determine the ability of flow battery companies to scale up and win customer projects. The electrolyte is by far the most expensive component, and shipping it around the world presumably doesn’t make much sense.

AVL is initially buying in its vanadium pentoxide from the Arkansas processing plant of US Vanadium, which in turn has an annual production capacity of 4 million litres, or about 60MWh of flow batteries.

The company’s new factory was built by engineering firm Primero Group. With vanadium classed as a critical mineral by the Australian government, and with the aim to support domestic manufacturers, AVL received some government funds for the project.

AVL’s plant was developed and built quickly, from the site being selected and secured less than a year ago.

Minister King noted in remarks made this morning that the vanadium flow battery was invented in Australia in the 1980s, and that vanadium “will play a key role in the energy transition”.

Another vanadium electrolyte factory went online in Australia a few months ago. Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk officially opened a plant built by Veeco Group last June, producing liquid electrolyte with an initial production capacity of 175MW annually, which could ramp up to 350MWh.

Energy-Storage.news’ publisher Solar Media will host the 1st Energy Storage Summit Australia, on 21-22 May 2024 in Sydney, NSW. Featuring a packed programme of panels, presentations and fireside chats from industry leaders focusing on accelerating the market for energy storage across the country. For more information, go to the website.

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Jorge Vargas

Aspen Power has completed three financings totaling $241 million with J.P. Morgan, Lombard Odier and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc. (MUFG). The expanded credit facilities with J.P. Morgan and Lombard Odier, as well as a new construction-to-term facility with MUFG, are expected to promote Aspen Power’s continued strategic growth and support the timely and efficient construction of new solar energy projects.

“These recent financial closings represent a significant milestone for Aspen Power by more than doubling earlier commitments and establishing critical new relationships,” says Jorge Vargas, CEO of Aspen Power. “Not only do they underscore the confidence our valued financial partners have in our vision and strategy, but they also reflect a recognition of Aspen Power’s unwavering commitment to sustained growth.”

The $124 million construction-to-term facility with MUFG will directly support the construction of new solar assets across multiple states and revenue structures.

To date, Aspen Power has developed or acquired more than 600 renewable energy projects across 26 states.

Carlyle Capital Markets served as Aspen Power’s advisor.

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Solar racking specialist Unirac and solar attachment solutions provider S-5! say they are partnering to help advance solar mounting standards and further develop mutually beneficial technologies.

S-5! has extended its UL 2703 certifications for its clamps and brackets, which are now listed under Unirac’s certifications – an important compliance requirement increasingly demanded by Authorities Having Jurisdiction (AHJs) nationwide. This certification ensures that these clamps are now fully approved for use with Unirac’s NXT UMOUNT and SolarMount systems.

The companies say they are also actively working to incorporate each other’s solutions into their respective design tools – Unirac’s U-Builder and S-5!’s Solar Calculator. This integration is designed to streamline the solar project design process, making it more efficient and user-friendly.

“Our partnership with S-5! enables us to deliver solutions that not only boost efficiency and ensure code compliance but also reflect our unwavering commitment to our customers’ success,” says Ernest Gallegos, director of products at Unirac. “We see this as a significant advancement in our ongoing efforts to provide the best experience for our customers and to offer peace of mind to consumers adopting solar energy.”

Mark Gies, director of product management at S-5!, adds, “We are excited about taking our partnership with Unirac to a new level by incorporating our solar attachment solutions into their project design tools and technical certifications, making it easier and more efficient for design and permitting systems that utilize their rails and our clamps.”

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Ojjo says its patented Earth Truss System is now compatible with solar trackers from PV Hardware (PVH), providing more flexibility to utility-scale developers and engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) firms.

Ojjo’s Earth Truss foundation is designed to mitigate subsurface risk, improve installation accuracy, eliminate costly predrill and remediation processes, and reduce site grading requirements.

“We believe the combination of technologies is a huge asset to the industry,” says Will Cabana, vice president of sales, U.S. “Ojjo’s novel foundation system will allow our customers to overcome increasingly demanding soil and grading challenges, which is critical as we continue to expand in the U.S.”

Ojjo says it takes a supplier-agnostic approach to supporting solar tracker systems and is compatible with many leading manufacturers. The company engineers mating hardware for each tracker’s bearing componentry, allowing seamless integration without modifications to the tracker’s core system.

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Panasonic has promoted two Elite and seven Premium level solar installers, expanding the number of homeowners who will gain access to the benefits of Panasonic’s EVERVOLT home energy solutions portfolio.

The Elite installers are Celestial Solar Innovations LLC, Frederick, Md., and Northwest Renewables, Spokane, Wash.

The Premium installers include Connected Technology, Rocklin, Calif.; HE Solar, Buda, Texas; Integrating Systems Inc., Missoula, Mont.; GreenStar Solar Solutions, Bulverde, Texas; Photovoltaic Systems, Amherst, Wis.; RB Electric, Edmond, Okla.; and Solar Price Discovery Inc., Tarzana, Calif.

The newly promoted Premium installers will enjoy the benefits of access to qualified sales leads, marketing assets, training programs and a robust installer portal. Elite installers will gain all the benefits of the Premium installer level, as well as first access to new EVERVOLT products and rebates and preferred access to product availability.

Photo via Panasonic, courtesy of Western Solar, Bellingham, Wash.

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Michael Kushner

Solar developer Infiniti Energy has closed an $82.9 million structured finance facility with Fifth Third Bank, acting as administrative agent, to support a growing portfolio of commercial solar projects slated for construction this year.

The construction facility is being financed through Fiera Private Debt, and Flagstar Bank is providing the tax equity.

The financing will support the development, construction and operation of 21 MW of commercial and industrial (C&I) solar projects located in New Jersey, California and Illinois. Infiniti Energy will build, own and operate all sites under power purchase agreements with a diverse group of solar offtakers, including retail, commercial and industrial clients.

“The Infiniti team is excited to build on our expanding partnership with Fifth Third Bank and welcome the opportunity to work with Fiera and Flagstar to support our growing portfolio,” says Michael Kushner, Infiniti Energy CEO. “The projects that Infiniti owns and operates continue to generate affordable and sustainable solar energy for our clients while contributing to our country’s renewable transition.”

Development of the projects is already under way, and completion of the portfolio is expected this year.

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The firm has been awarded awarded US$8.9 million from the CEC and US$6.7 million from the DoE alongside a US$9.4 million Series A financing led by Khosla Ventures.

The company is aiming to use thermochemical energy storage (TCES) technology to decarbonise industrial heat as well as deploy grid-scale energy storage for electricity on the other. It claimed its thermochemical battery has an energy density comparable to lithium-ion, the industry leader.

RedoxBlox’s technology is a storage module with a vessel filled with a ‘proprietary and abundantly available, low-cost’ metal oxide material. To charge, electricity heats the metal oxide pellets to 1000-1500°C, triggering a chemical reaction that releases oxygen and stores heat in the form of chemical energy.

To discharge, air is directed through the module and the metal oxide consume the oxygen to reverse the reaction and release heat. The heat can either be used directly for industrial purposes, or through a gas turbine to generate power.

The CEC’s funding will go towards a pilot project to power a turbogenerator with up to 24 hours of energy storage capacity, in partnership with the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) and the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI).

Meanwhile the DoE’s Industrial Efficiency and Decarbonization Office selected RedoxBlox for a an industrial-scale TCES project to decarbonise industrial steam at a West Virginia plant of chemicals firm Dow.

Eos signs electrolyte supply deal

Non-lithium, long-duration battery storage startup Eos Energy Enterprises has signed a supply deal to cover at least 75% of the total zinc-bromide electrolyte to be used in its next generation of products.  

The company said last week (9 January) that it has extended its partnership with TETRA Technologies, a completion fluids and water management services provider to the upstream energy industry, through which the pair had since 2021 been working to improve the electrolyte solution’s quality.  

Eos’ zinc aqueous battery technology stores electrical energy through deposition of zinc. Aqueous electrolyte is held within individual battery cells, dynamically separating the electrodes. Ions move through the electrolyte during charge and discharge to the electrodes, creating a current flow through the bipolar stack.  

CEO Joe Mastrangelo said the company’s strategy has “centered around finding raw materials being used in other industries to provide both scale and cost efficiencies,” and as such TETRA’s investment in bromine production can be leveraged.  

TETRA itself said yesterday (15 January) that it has secured a US$190 million funded term loan and US$75 million delayed-draw term loan to refinance an existing term loan and provide capital towards a bromine processing project in Arkansas, US.  

It wasn’t clear from a company release how much of that investment would be geared towards Eos Energy Enterprises’ offtake. However TETRA is set to be supplying at least 75% of the zinc-bromide electrolyte to be used in Eos’ new, third-generation Z3 battery technology and TETRA CEO Brady Murphy said the relationship with the zinc battery maker “dovetails nicely with our bromine production plans, and we are excited to be part of Eos’s future plans and Inflation Reduction Act objectives”.  

As a US-based manufacturer of clean energy equipment, Eos can expect to avail of tax credit incentives created in the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). The company said in quarterly financial results statements in November that it will not be profitable until it can fully automate production of its storage systems, with CFO Nathan Kroeker stating that the Gen3 battery product was designed at around half the cost of the previous iteration.  

ESS Inc commissions unit at US military base

An iron electrolyte flow battery system manufactured and supplied by ESS Technology Inc (ESS Inc), has gone online at a US Military base facility.  

The Oregon, US-headquartered tech company said yesterday (15 January) that its Energy Warehouse branded system has been commissioned at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri. ESS Inc’s proprietary flow battery design is aimed at medium- to long-duration energy storage (LDES) applications.  

Situated at the US Army Corps of Engineers’ (USACE’s) Contingency Base Integration Training Evaluation Center (CBITEC) at Fort Leonard Wood, the system will enable the USACE to reduce its reliance on fuel generators and is integrated into a tactical microgrid.  

The demonstration project will therefore show how flexible LDES technologies such as the iron flow battery, “reduces total runtime on generators while increasing efficiency and allowing generators to last longer at Forward Operating Bases”, according to USACE operational energy programme manager Tom Decker.  

“ESS’ safe and resilient technology can dramatically reduce refueling logistics requirements and has the potential to assist in transition to renewable energy. We look forward to demonstrating to all service branches how incorporating an iron flow battery can increase resiliency in military power applications,” Decker said.  

If the project sounds familiar to long-time industry watchers, it’s because the new Energy Warehouse will be replacing a prototype flow battery system ESS Inc installed at the base in 2016-2017. While the new system’s output and capacity weren’t given, the original system was a 60kW/225kWh unit.    

Energy-Storage.news’ publisher Solar Media will host the 5th Energy Storage Summit USA, 19-20 March 2024 in Austin, Texas. Featuring a packed programme of panels, presentations and fireside chats from industry leaders focusing on accelerating the market for energy storage across the country. For more information, go to the website.

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