Peak Energy, a U.S.-based company developing low-cost, giga-scale energy storage technology for the grid, has announced an agreement with RWE Americas, a leading global energy company with approximately 13 GW of operating assets in the U.S., to pilot Peak Energy’s proprietary passively cooled sodium-ion grid storage battery technology. The pilot project, which will be deployed in Eastern Wisconsin at the RWE lab, makes RWE Americas a first mover in bringing next generation, capital efficient energy storage to the grid, if fully adopted. Built to maximize sodium-ion’s stability and thermal advantages, Peak Energy’s battery storage system dramatically reduces the cost of energy storage and eases the need for costly new power plants, directly addressing the energy cost crisis in America.
“Energy storage is central to providing dispatchable, reliable energy on demand. Peak’s innovations, enabled by sodium-ion batteries, greatly reduce energy storage costs,” said Landon Mossburg, Chief Executive Officer of Peak Energy. “Delivering the lowest cost electron is Peak Energy’s north star, and we’re proud to work with RWE Americas to operate our cost-optimized batteries.”
Peak’s proprietary energy storage system enables safe operation at a wide temperature range without a performance decrease, dramatically altering the economics of energy storage. Relying on highly stable and better performing sodium-ion (NFPP) battery cells, Peak’s energy storage system eliminates costly routine maintenance, removes cooling systems that waste energy, and reduces “overbuild” – the amount of excess storage required to account for capacity degradation over time. Through these improvements, Peak’s energy storage systems reduce the lifetime cost of energy stored by an average of $70/kWh, which is equivalent to approximately half of the total price of a battery system today.
Like most of the United States, the MISO region – which encompasses Wisconsin – is facing unprecedented energy demand growth, rapid cost increases, and a dearth of energy storage capacity. Last year, a report from Aurora Energy Research concluded that the installation of 10 GWh of battery storage capacity over the next decade could reduce total MISO system costs by as much as $27 billion compared to a baseline scenario. Deploying that same capacity using Peak’s GS1.1 systems would reduce total storage system costs by more than 25% relative to conventional lithium-ion solutions, through Peak’s passive design that lowers operating costs and reduces lifetime maintenance. Batteries on the grid improve overall reliability and reduce consumer costs by storing surplus energy at low demand times and deploying it to the grid at peak demand, limiting reliance on expensive energy spot markets. This reduces the need for costly new generation technologies and maximizes the dispatchable use of economically efficient intermittent energy generation sources.
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