Thermal vitality storage may join low cost however intermittent renewable electrical energy with heat-hungry industrial processes. These methods can rework electrical energy into warmth after which, like typical batteries, retailer the vitality and dispatch it as wanted.
Rondo Power is among the firms working to supply and deploy thermal batteries. The corporate’s warmth storage system depends on a resistance heater, which transforms electrical energy into warmth utilizing the identical technique as an area heater or toaster—however on a bigger scale, and reaching a a lot increased temperature. That warmth is then used to heat up rigorously engineered and organized stacks of bricks, which retailer the warmth for later use. Air blown over the recent bricks can then be used to generate steam, or delivered on to warmth up tools.
By utilizing widespread supplies and designing tools that may work with present services, Rondo is working to indicate that its expertise can combine right into a sector the place price is vital. “We’re proving that is economical proper now,” says John O’Donnell, the corporate’s CEO.
Rondo has been operating its first industrial pilot at an ethanol plant in California since March 2023. The corporate can also be scaling up, manufacturing tools in a manufacturing unit in Taiwan that it’s already introduced plans to broaden.
A lately introduced venture with the beverage firm Diageo will see Rondo’s warmth batteries put in in a Kentucky whiskey distillery the place Bulleit bourbon is made, together with considered one of Diageo’s different services. In March, the venture acquired a lift from the US Division of Power, which chosen it to obtain $75 million in funding as a part of a bigger push to wash up industrial emissions.
Rondo is way from the one contender within the thermal battery area, which now consists of firms utilizing the whole lot from molten salt and steel to crushed-up rocks to retailer warmth.
