Photoncycle targets low-cost vitality storage with a intelligent hydrogen resolution

For years, the photo voltaic vitality sector has grappled with interseasonal vitality storage. The flexibility to harness the excess photo voltaic vitality of summer time months to be used in the course of the winter has remained an elusive aim, with current options like batteries falling brief as a result of prohibitive prices and restricted lifespans. Hydrogen, in the meantime, regardless of its clean-burning properties, has been sidelined as a result of inefficiency and excessive prices.

Photoncycle — a startup rising from the depths of an accelerator in Oslo Science Park in Oslo, Norway — has been engaged on an answer. With a imaginative and prescient as brilliant because the summer time solar, the startup claims its strong hydrogen-based know-how can retailer vitality extra effectively in an ammonia synthesis reactor. The declare is that this tech does the storage extra cost-effectively than any battery or liquid hydrogen resolution in the marketplace.

A schematic of how Photoncycle envisions its full system when put in at a home. Picture Credit: Photoncycle

“Lithium-ion batteries use expensive metals. Our materials is tremendous low cost: To retailer 10,000 kilowatt-hours, it prices round $1,500, so it’s nearly nothing. As well as, our storage resolution is 20 occasions the density of a lithium-ion battery, and also you don’t lose the present,” founder and CEO Bjørn Brandtzaeg explains in an interview with Information World. “Meaning we have now a system the place you possibly can include vitality over time, enabling seasonal storage. It’s a totally completely different factor than conventional batteries.” 

Photoncycle employs water and electrical energy to supply hydrogen. That in itself isn’t unusual should you’ve been following gasoline cell automobile know-how. Nonetheless, the corporate’s method incorporates an progressive twist: a reversible high-temperature gasoline cell. This superior gasoline cell can produce hydrogen and generate electrical energy inside the identical unit. 

The core of Photoncycle’s innovation lies in its remedy of hydrogen. They course of the hydrogen after which make the most of its know-how to transform and retailer it in a strong kind. The corporate claims this storage methodology isn’t solely protected, owing to the non-flammable and non-explosive nature of the strong state, but additionally extremely environment friendly. It permits hydrogen storage at densities roughly 50% larger than liquid hydrogen, presenting a big development in hydrogen storage options. These improvements kind the cornerstone of Photoncycle’s system, facilitating protected and dense hydrogen storage, which the corporate says is a big step ahead in vitality know-how.

Present clear vitality options akin to rooftop solar energy are restricted by inconsistent provide as a result of unpredictable nature of climate situations. A sturdy, reusable vitality storage resolution may bridge these timings, making certain a secure vitality provide when these renewable sources encounter unavoidable intermittent intervals. 

Nice in concept, however not with out its personal challenges.

“The Netherlands is the nation in Europe with the very best density of rooftop photo voltaic. We’re seeing a large ramp now due to excessive vitality costs; everybody desires photo voltaic on the roof,” Brandtzaeg says. He provides, nonetheless, that this methodology can backfire for householders: “In July final 12 months, within the Netherlands, in the midst of the day, you had to pay €500 a megawatt hour to export your electricity.”

Placing the vitality storage together with the home producing the ability successfully lets homes go off-grid. Photoncycle says it has examined and labored the primary parts of its resolution — the following step is to combine it right into a system. If profitable, the corporate says it will possibly severely problem Powerwall, Tesla’s lithium-ion battery resolution.

David Gerez, CTO at Photoncycle, and Ole Laugerud, who’s a Photoncycle chemist, in Photoncycle’s purpose-built lab, which has been operational for shut to 2 years. Picture Credit: Photoncycle

“It is a comparatively advanced system — that’s why we have now so many PhDs in several disciplines engaged on this. The explanation why Elon Musk stated that hydrogen is silly, is that if you convert electrical energy to hydrogen and again, you might be dropping fairly a little bit of vitality,” Brandtzaeg says. He believes his firm can flip this bug right into a characteristic. “In a residential setting the place 70% of vitality wants are heating, there is a chance to make use of that extra warmth to supply sizzling water. We’ll goal markets the place persons are utilizing pure fuel for heating for the time being after which exchange the fuel boiler in the home utilizing the present water-based infrastructure.”

Brandtzaeg’s confidence relating to the idea’s operational framework is compelling. He gestured towards a small mock-up of their operations plant inside their labs, scaled all the way down to the dimensions of a automotive battery. Brandtzaeg believes this scaling needs to be problem-free, citing it as the first purpose they felt assured shifting ahead with the venture. 

In the case of energy supply, it takes a short time for the hydrogen to generate electrical energy, so whereas it’s spooling up, the corporate depends on an middleman, extra standard, battery for load balancing. The agency actually has traders’ consideration: Photoncycle simply raised $5.3 million (€5 million) to construct its first few energy storage gadgets in Denmark, which Photoncycle has chosen as its check market. 

“We may have raised 10 occasions as a lot as we did, given the curiosity. However after this elevate, I’m nonetheless a majority proprietor,” Brandtzaeg says. “I needed to maintain management over the enterprise so long as attainable and never elevate extra capital than we have to deliver this service to market.”