The Faraday Institution and the US National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) will jointly explore projects to improve high-capacity batteries, in addition to battery material recycling for usage in electric vehicles (EV).
Formalised with the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) the collaboration increases cross-research between the UK and US and aims to develop battery technologies that could be integral in a low-carbon world.
Central to this development will be the advancement of battery energy storage technologies, a crucial component for the energy transition. Energy storage technologies are the perfect complement to variable energy sources and provide a means to supply captured renewable energy when the grid demand is high.
This allows a continuous transition away from fossil fuel usage and a rapid upscaling in renewable energy generation sources. The battery storage sector is continuing to grow in the UK, with owners and operators seeing their revenues surge in recent months as ancillary services like Dynamic Containment hit record highs.
In the UK, the pipeline of utility-scale battery storage projects has reached over 20GW across 800 projects. This has been bolstered by a recent surge of applications being submitted, with a record Q2’21 that saw the pipeline jump from almost 17GW of total capacity to over 20GW for example. As such, the next few years could show a major increase in energy storage deployment.
Contributing to these figures, 2021 also saw a huge upsurge in the amount of battery energy storage projects being developed in the UK. This is due to various factors including a decrease in the costs of battery storage technologies with IRENA stating “lithium-ion battery costs for stationary applications could fall to below £165 ($200) per kilowatt-hour by 2030 for installed systems”.
“Electrochemical energy storage is one of DOE’s priorities, and collaborative activities have been established between the national laboratories in this area,” said Peter Green, deputy laboratory director of Science and Technology at NREL.
“An important goal is also to establish a sustainable supply chain for critical materials, such as cobalt, and to establish a lithium battery recycling ecosystem to recover and reintroduce these materials into the battery supply chain.”
The collaboration between Faraday and NREL also aims to explore battery material recycling for usage within EVs amid sourcing concerns. There are already worries over supplies of certain critical battery materials, such as cobalt, and these will likely grow with continuing supply chain restrictions and geopolitical concerns.
In response, battery plant developers can expect to look at ways to improve recycling and seek ways to extend the lifespan of existing assets, for example by using second-life batteries.
“The depth and breadth of scientific knowledge across the US National Labs and the UK’s world-leading universities is what allows for this kind of innovative partnership,” said Professor Pam Thomas, CEO of the Faraday Institution.
“By strengthening the connections amongst the best battery research groups in the US and the UK, we will accelerate discovery and much needed breakthroughs in high-capacity cathode materials and develop recycling routes for lithium-ion batteries.”
In 2017, the Faraday Institution released the £246 million Faraday Battery Challenge, which had been used to develop the UK’s “first” battery development facility in the Midlands.