Prof. Sanjoy Banerjee of City College of New York and City University of New York Energy Institute, Sandia National Laboratories, Urban Electric Power, Inc., Brookhaven National Laboratory, and the Department of Energy Office of Electricity, Energy Storage Research Program won the 2019 US Environmental Protection Agency Green Chemistry Challenge Award in the Academic category. The team was recognized for creating large-scale zinc-manganese oxide batteries that can be recharged thousands of times without the typical decrease in the length of the battery’s life-time. These batteries do not have some of the limitations of lithium-ion and lead-acid batteries, and they use materials that are abundant and common in existing supply chains. Sandians Tim Lambert, Mathew Lim, Igor Kolesnichenko, and Babu Chalamala, along with Prof. Igor Vasiliev from New Mexico State University were also involved in this research project.

Senator Lisa Murkowski, along with Dr. Imre Gyuk, Director of the Energy Storage Program at the Office of Electricity, Department of Energy, and members of the Sandia National Laboratories Energy Storage Systems team, were in Cordova, Alaska for the ribbon cutting of Cordova Electric Cooperative’s battery energy storage system. The goal for the Cordova Electric Cooperative is to be 90% renewable by 2025.

https://www.webcenter11.com/content/news/Cordova-cuts-ribbon-on-new-energy-future-511104161.html

The Sterling Municipal Light Department is marking a major milestone related to the department’s two energy storage systems. In March, SMLD celebrated over $1 million in avoided costs to the light department, thanks to the two systems.

“We would like to thank our partners who made all of this possible,” said SMLD General Manager Sean Hamilton. “They include SMLD commissioners, staff and operations crew, along with the Town of Sterling; Judith Judson from Mass. Department of Energy Resources; Dr. Imre Gyuk of the U.S. Department of Energy; Daniel Borneo and Dr. Raymond Byrne of Sandia National Laboratories; Todd Olinsky-Paul of CEG and CESA; MMWEC; Scott Reynolds, of Reynold’s Engineering LLC ; Mike Barrett of PLM; Josh Teigiser of Origis Energy; Sachin Patel of Last Mile Energy, Arlen Orchard and SMUD for project technical information, and Jared Carpenter and Jim Frawley for grant technical information.”

https://www.telegram.com/item/20190419/sterling-light-storage-units-mark-milestone

Babu Chalamala, manager of Sandia’s Energy Storage Technology and Systems Department, provided testimony at the State Capitol in Sacramento, on Feb. 13, at a State Assembly briefing on Zero-Carbon Grid by 2045.

The well-attended briefing, hosted by a former LLNL scientist and current Assemblymember Bill Quirk (D-Hayward), sought to explore the challenges California must address as it moves towards its zero-carbon electricity grid and 100 percent renewable generation goals by 2045.

Babu was asked to provide an overview of current and future energy storage technologies that will be necessary to accommodate the influx of intermittent renewable generation into the grid, as well as the role of bulk storage and distributed storage. Other panels and speakers included executives from the California Energy Commission, California Public Utilities Commission, California Independent System Operator, SoCal Edison and Lawrence Berkeley National Lab.

Sandia National Laboratories has improved the predictability of lithium-ion battery safety through understanding the common aspects of thermal safety over a diverse range of safety-related measurements.  A series of two open-access articles in the Journal of the Electrochemical Society describe recent work funded by the Office of Electricity Energy Storage Program.A model is developed that provides improved predictions based on a diverse range of safety-related measurements available in the literature including a change in the heat-release behavior responsible for more rapid heating at higher temperatures.  This accelerated heat release at higher temperatures must be considered for thermal runaway models to yield meaningful predictions of cascading failure scenarios, which are of concern for grid-storage applications as well as for backup power applications and also electric vehicles. The enhanced model yields excellent predictions of laboratory-scale calorimetry measurements from many researchers published over two decades, encompassing graphite samples with material properties spanning the range utilized as negative electrodes in commercial lithium-ion cells.

Full length papers at: http://jes.ecsdl.org/content/165/16/A3878.full.pdf+html; http://jes.ecsdl.org/content/165/16/A3891.full.pdf+html

On October 24, 2018, the Hon. Bruce Walker, from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Electricity, came to Sandia to discuss his department’s mission and goals. Mr. Walker discussed the Office’s role in meeting the Nation’s growing demand for reliable electricity by overcoming the challenges of an aging electric grid and addressing supply chain vulnerabilities. Watch the video.

EPB has energized a 100kW/400kWh Vanadium Redox Flow Battery as part of a national research effort to explore the best use of cutting edge technologies that could be implemented across the United States to modernize the power grid. EPB’s project constitutes a partnership with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Sandia National Laboratories, and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. The battery system for the project is provided by UniEnergy Technologies (UET), a U.S. manufacturer. Read more.

The Natural Energy Laboratory of Hawai‘i Authority (NELHA) in partnership with Hawai‘i Electric Light Company (HELCO), the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Electricity (DOE-OE), the Ulupono Initiative, and UniEnergy Technologies (UET) have announced their intent to install a 100kW/500kWh advanced vanadium energy storage system (ESS) later this year at the Hawai‘i Ocean Science and Technology Park (HOST Park) administered by NELHA. Read more.

On June 12, 2017 UniEnergy Technology (UET) and Pacific Northwest Laboratory (PNNL) jointly received the prestigious EPA / American Chemical Society Green Chemistry Challenge Award. The achievement being recognized is the development and commercialization of an advanced Vanadium flow battery. Using an ingenious mixed acid electrolyte, research at PNNL, funded by DOE’s Office of Electricity, over a five year period succeeded in cutting the cost of the storage system in half, doubling the temperature window, and roughly doubling the energy density. UET licensed the technology, perfected the manufacturing process, found financial partners and has started to commercialize the system. As a flow battery the UniEnergy battery separates power and energy. Power is produced in a reversible fuel cell and the energy resides in the vanadium electrolyte stored in large tanks. As a result the company was able to produce a long duration, four hour battery with long life time and little degradation. More than 100 megawatt hours of UET systems are deployed, ordered, or awarded.

The ceremony took place at Washington’s National Academy. The Green Awards Program recognizes individuals and organizations on a national level for successfully researching, developing, and implementing outstanding green chemical technologies. Five awards were presented at the event. Dr. Imre Gyuk, director of OE’s Energy Storage Program, joined the UET/PNNL team on stage during the award presentation.

The Sandia National Laboratories storage program is involved in several field validation projects using the technology. A blog providing further details on the award is available on the DOE-OE web site: https://energy.gov/oe/articles/unienergy-technologies-and-pnnl-recognized-advancing-energy-storage-national-level.

R&D Magazine has recognized Sandia National Laboratories researchers’ work in developing innovative battery testing with the annual R&D 100 Award.

As principle investigator of the Precision High Power Battery Tester, Dr. Summer Ferreira was presented with the R&D 100 Green Tech Special Recognition Award.

The PHPBT uses high-precision charge/discharge test measurements at up to 200A current to capture electrochemical measurements such as coulombic efficiency with greater accuracy than was previously possible at currents applicable to EV and stationary storage applications. The goal is to detect minute signs of battery degradation earlier than previous testing, providing insight into a battery’s long-term capabilities and enabling engineers to better select feasible technologies from those needing more development.

With support from the Dept. of Energy’s Office of Electricity (DOE OE) and ARPA-e, PHPBT research was done in conjunction with Arbin Instruments, Ford Motor Company, and Montana Tech. Arbin has since commercialized the PHPBT technology.

R&D Magazine presents the annual R&D 100 awards to honor the year’s 100-most innovative technologies as selected by an independent panel of more than 70 judges.