New report released by U.S. National Laboratory on game-changing grid-scale battery technology
The Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) released a report through the US Department of Energy’s Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI) on a new thermal battery technology that is up to 90% more cost-effective than lithium batteries for large-scale energy storage. The new thermal battery technology was developed by SRNL and exclusively licensed by the Swedish cleantech company TEXEL Energy Storage.
Inexpensive renewable energy, such as wind and solar, is just the first step towards a CO2 free energy future, where cost-effective and efficient energy storage is considered the final step, or “The Holy Grail”. The SRNL in cooperation with TEXEL Energy Storage is nearing the solution. In the report, SRNL performed a techno-economic analysis comparing the new thermal battery technology to Li-ion batteries to store energy when integrated with grid-scale photovoltaic installations. The SRNL team examined the impacts on the levelized cost of storage (LCOS) for several scenarios and found that the thermal battery technology should achieve a LCOS ranging from $0.019/kWh - $0.073/kWh, at higher volume production, which compares positively to the cost of storage expected today for Lithium-Ion ranging from $0.087/kWh - $0.32/kWh.
“The report from SRNL is valuable information for all our external partners and further indicates that the world will be able to move away from fossil fuels in an economical, sustainable manner. We hope that this information will help us to mobilize needed funds and support to rapidly move the technology towards commercialization”, said Lars Jacobsson, CEO of TEXEL Energy Storage.
Lead author and the inventor of the SRNL thermal battery technology, Dr. Ragaiy Zidan, added: “This study has shown the tremendous potential of exploiting chemical bonds to efficiently store energy, an area that SRNL has been advancing for many years. We look forward to scaling this technology with TEXEL.”
Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL), one of US Department of Energy's (DOE) seventeen national laboratories, is considered as one of the world's leading research labs on hydrogen-related technologies. SRNL has developed the new metal hydride materials used in the thermal battery and in combination with the Stirling Converter, exclusively owned by TEXEL and originally developed by Ford Motors, the technologies together create the new unique energy storage technology known as the thermal battery.
“Cost of new technologies is of course important, as our world is controlled by money, but more important for our future is that our new technology minimizes consumption of the planet's resources and could be 100% circular. If technologies consume our planets resources, they are not sustainable or renewable”, said Lars Jacobsson.
The global energy storage business is expected to boom in the coming decades as utilities will look to batteries to backstop an increasing amount of intermittent solar and wind power. BloombergNEF forecasts that the worldwide energy storage market could attract nearly $1 trillion in investments over the next three decades.
For more information, contact
Daniel Wilke Head of PR
Email: daniel@txles.com
Tel: +46 736 329 827
About TEXEL Energy Storage AB
TEXEL Energy Storage AB is a Swedish origin cleantech company specializing in the development and marketing of renewable, sustainable and circular energy storage and energy production solutions. The focus of the TEXEL technology is based on a number of key components, like the purchase of the worlds most developed Stirling Converter (converting heat to electricity), originally developed by The Swedish Military Submarine company Kokum’s and Ford Motors 2012. In 2018 TEXEL signed a license agreement with US Department of Energy (DOE) and Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) the laboratory behind the hydrogen bomb. TEXEL has the headquarters in Gothenburg, with a R&D center in Halmstad, Sweden. TEXEL has a subsidiary in UK, a subsidiary in US as well as an office in Palo Alto, California. : +46(0)31-170000 – info@txles.com - more about TEXEL www.txles.com
About Savannah River National Laboratory:
The Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) is the applied research and development laboratory at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Savannah River Site (SRS). The laboratory applies state-of-the-art science to provide practical, high-value, cost-effective solutions to complex technical problems. The laboratory earns its world-class reputation because of its talented people and their unwavering commitment to safety, security and quality in the delivery of technology solutions that work.
