Form Energy

Last updated
Form Energy
Company typePrivate
Industry Energy
Founded2017;7 years ago (2017)
Headquarters
Somerville, MA
,
US
Key people
Mateo Jaramillo (CEO)
Website formenergy.com

Form Energy is an American energy storage company focused on developing a new class of cost-effective, multi-day energy storage systems that will attempt to enable a reliable and fully-renewable electric grid year-round. Form Energy's commercial product is a rechargeable iron-air battery capable of storing electricity for 100 hours at system costs competitive with legacy power plants. [1]

Contents

History

Form Energy was founded in 2017 by former head of battery development for Tesla Mateo Jaramillo, MIT professor and battery scientist Yet-Ming Chiang, Ted Wiley, William Woodford and Marco Ferrara. [2]

In December 2022, the company announced its first manufacturing plant site: 55 acres in Weirton, West Virginia. The US$760 million project was expected to employ ~750 workers and to begin initial shipments in 2024. [3] The plant's construction will be funded in part by the state of West Virginia with $105 million in surplus tax dollars. [4]

In January 2023, the eight-state utility Xcel Energy contracted for two systems, at Pueblo, Colorado, and at Becker, Minnesota. Each project is to provide 10 megawatts of instantaneous power for up to 100 hours, and store 1 gigawatt-hour. [5]

In 2024, Form engineered a system that converts powdered iron ore to metallic iron using a low-temperature alkaline solution stimulated by electric current. This can be run continuously at high efficiency, and it can be scaled up in smaller increments. [6]

Technology

The active components of Form Energy's iron-air battery system are iron, water, and air. [7] The basic principle of operation is reversible rusting (oxidation). While discharging, the battery breathes in oxygen from the air and converts iron metal to rust. While charging, the application of an electrical current converts the rust back to iron and the battery breathes out oxygen. [8]

Each individual battery is about the size of a washing machine. Each of these modules is filled with a water-based, non-flammable electrolyte, similar to the electrolyte used in AA batteries. Inside the liquid electrolyte are stacks of between 10 and 20 meter-scale cells, which include iron electrodes and air electrodes, the parts of the battery that enable the electrochemical reactions to store and discharge electricity. [9]

The battery modules are grouped together in modular megawatt-scale power blocks, which comprise thousands of battery modules in an environmentally protected enclosure. Depending on the system size, tens to hundreds of these power blocks will be connected to the electricity grid. In its least dense configuration, a one megawatt system requires about an acre of land. Higher density configurations can achieve greater than three megawatts per acre. [9]

The company has demonstrated that its batteries are capable of storing energy to deliver the 100+ hour duration required to make wind power, hydropower, and solar energy reliable year round, and claims less than 1/10th the cost of lithium-ion battery technology. [10] Cells underwent a UL9540A fire test in 2024. [11]

Finance

Investors include Breakthrough Energy Ventures, itself funded by Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Coatue Management, TPG (through TPG Rise Climate), steel manufacturer ArcelorMittal, Perry Creek Capital, NGP Energy Technology Partners III, Temasek, Energy Impact Partners, Prelude Ventures, MIT’s investment fund The Engine, Capricorn Investment Group, Eni Next, and Macquarie Capital.

In August 2021, Form Energy announced the close of a $240 million Series D financing round led by ArcelorMittal’s XCarb™ innovation fund. In October 2022, they closed a $450 million series E round led by TPG Rise. [12]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Energy storage</span> Captured energy for later usage

Energy storage is the capture of energy produced at one time for use at a later time to reduce imbalances between energy demand and energy production. A device that stores energy is generally called an accumulator or battery. Energy comes in multiple forms including radiation, chemical, gravitational potential, electrical potential, electricity, elevated temperature, latent heat and kinetic. Energy storage involves converting energy from forms that are difficult to store to more conveniently or economically storable forms.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sodium–sulfur battery</span> Type of molten-salt battery

A sodium–sulfur (NaS) battery is a type of molten-salt battery that uses liquid sodium and liquid sulfur electrodes. This type of battery has a similar energy density to lithium-ion batteries, and is fabricated from inexpensive and low-toxicity materials. Due to the high operating temperature required, as well as the highly reactive nature of sodium and sodium polysulfides, these batteries are primarily suited for stationary energy storage applications, rather than for use in vehicles. Molten Na-S batteries are scalable in size: there is a 1 MW microgrid support system on Catalina Island CA (USA) and a 50 MW/300 MWh system in Fukuoka, Kyushu, (Japan). In 2024, only one company produced molten NaS batteries on a commercial scale. BASF Stationary Energy Storage GmbH, a wholly owned subsidiary of BASF SE, acts as a distributor and development partner for the NaS batteries produced by NGK Insulators.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Xcel Energy</span> American utility company

Xcel Energy Inc. is a U.S. regulated electric utility and natural gas delivery company based in Minneapolis, Minnesota, serving more than 3.7 million electric customers and 2.1 million natural gas customers across parts of eight states. It consists of four operating subsidiaries: Northern States Power-Minnesota, Northern States Power-Wisconsin, Public Service Company of Colorado, and Southwestern Public Service Co.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">ISG Weirton Steel</span>

Weirton Steel Corporation was a steel production company founded by Ernest T. Weir in West Virginia in 1909. It was at one time one of the world's largest producers of tin plate products.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Grid energy storage</span> Large scale electricity supply management

Grid energy storage, also known as large-scale energy storage, are technologies connected to the electrical power grid that store energy for later use. These systems help balance supply and demand by storing excess electricity from variable renewables such as solar and inflexible sources like nuclear power, releasing it when needed. They further provide essential grid services, such as helping to restart the grid after a power outage.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Zinc–air battery</span> High-electrical energy density storage device

A zinc–air battery is a metal–air electrochemical cell powered by the oxidation of zinc with oxygen from the air. During discharge, a mass of zinc particles forms a porous anode, which is saturated with an electrolyte. Oxygen from the air reacts at the cathode and forms hydroxyl ions which migrate into the zinc paste and form zincate, releasing electrons to travel to the cathode. The zincate decays into zinc oxide and water returns to the electrolyte. The water and hydroxyl from the anode are recycled at the cathode, so the water is not consumed. The reactions produce a theoretical voltage of 1.65 Volts, but is reduced to 1.35–1.4 V in available cells.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peaking power plant</span> Reserved for high demand times

Peaking power plants, also known as peaker plants, and occasionally just "peakers", are power plants that generally run only when there is a high demand, known as peak demand, for electricity. Because they supply power only occasionally, the power supplied commands a much higher price per kilowatt hour than base load power. Peak load power plants are dispatched in combination with base load power plants, which supply a dependable and consistent amount of electricity, to meet the minimum demand.

A zinc-bromine battery is a rechargeable battery system that uses the reaction between zinc metal and bromine to produce electric current, with an electrolyte composed of an aqueous solution of zinc bromide. Zinc has long been used as the negative electrode of primary cells. It is a widely available, relatively inexpensive metal. It is rather stable in contact with neutral and alkaline aqueous solutions. For this reason, it is used today in zinc–carbon and alkaline primaries.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Molten-salt battery</span> Type of battery that uses molten salts

Molten-salt batteries are a class of battery that uses molten salts as an electrolyte and offers both a high energy density and a high power density. Traditional non-rechargeable thermal batteries can be stored in their solid state at room temperature for long periods of time before being activated by heating. Rechargeable liquid-metal batteries are used for industrial power backup, special electric vehiclesand for grid energy storage, to balance out intermittent renewable power sources such as solar panels and wind turbines.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Electric vehicle battery</span> Battery used to power the electric motors of a battery electric vehicle or hybrid electric vehicle

An electric vehicle battery is a rechargeable battery used to power the electric motors of a battery electric vehicle (BEV) or hybrid electric vehicle (HEV).

A photovoltaic system, also called a PV system or solar power system, is an electric power system designed to supply usable solar power by means of photovoltaics. It consists of an arrangement of several components, including solar panels to absorb and convert sunlight into electricity, a solar inverter to convert the output from direct to alternating current, as well as mounting, cabling, and other electrical accessories to set up a working system. Many utility-scale PV systems use tracking systems that follow the sun's daily path across the sky to generate more electricity than fixed-mounted systems.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Electric battery</span> Power supply with electrochemical cells

An electric battery is a source of electric power consisting of one or more electrochemical cells with external connections for powering electrical devices. When a battery is supplying power, its positive terminal is the cathode and its negative terminal is the anode. The terminal marked negative is the source of electrons. When a battery is connected to an external electric load, those negatively charged electrons flow through the circuit and reach to the positive terminal, thus cause a redox reaction by attracting positively charged ions, cations. Thus converts high-energy reactants to lower-energy products, and the free-energy difference is delivered to the external circuit as electrical energy. Historically the term "battery" specifically referred to a device composed of multiple cells; however, the usage has evolved to include devices composed of a single cell.

A metal–air electrochemical cell is an electrochemical cell that uses an anode made from pure metal and an external cathode of ambient air, typically with an aqueous or aprotic electrolyte.

Aquion Energy was a Bethlehem, Pennsylvania and Washington, D.C.–based company that manufactured sodium ion batteries and electricity storage systems.

Cryogenic energy storage (CES) is the use of low temperature (cryogenic) liquids such as liquid air or liquid nitrogen to store energy. The technology is primarily used for the large-scale storage of electricity. Following grid-scale demonstrator plants, a 250 MWh commercial plant is now under construction in the UK, and a 400 MWh store is planned in the USA.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Battery energy storage system</span> Energy storage system using electrochemical secondary cells

A battery energy storage system (BESS), battery storage power station, battery energy grid storage (BEGS) or battery grid storage is a type of energy storage technology that uses a group of batteries in the grid to store electrical energy. Battery storage is the fastest responding dispatchable source of power on electric grids, and it is used to stabilise those grids, as battery storage can transition from standby to full power in under a second to deal with grid contingencies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gravity battery</span> Type of electrical storage device

A gravity battery is a type of energy storage device that stores gravitational energy—the potential energy E given to an object with a mass m when it is raised against the force of gravity of Earth (g, 9.8 m/s²) into a height difference h.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tesla Megapack</span> Large-scale battery energy storage product manufactured by Tesla Energy

The Tesla Megapack is a large-scale rechargeable lithium-ion battery stationary energy storage product, intended for use at battery storage power stations, manufactured by Tesla Energy, the energy subsidiary of Tesla, Inc.

The Iron Redox Flow Battery (IRFB), also known as Iron Salt Battery (ISB), stores and releases energy through the electrochemical reaction of iron salt. This type of battery belongs to the class of redox-flow batteries (RFB), which are alternative solutions to Lithium-Ion Batteries (LIB) for stationary applications. The IRFB can achieve up to 70% round trip energy efficiency. In comparison, other long duration storage technologies such as pumped hydro energy storage provide around 80% round trip energy efficiency.

References

  1. ↑ Collins, Leigh (2021-07-23). "World's cheapest energy storage will be an iron-air battery, says Jeff Bezos-backed start-up". rechargenews.com. Retrieved 2024-10-21.
  2. ↑ Gold, Russell (2021-07-22). "Wall Street Journal | Startup Claims Breakthrough in Long-Duration Batteries". Wall Street Journal. ISSN   0099-9660 . Retrieved 2021-09-29.
  3. ↑ Blain, Loz (2023-01-09). "Form Energy's ultra-cheap iron-air batteries to get $760M factory". New Atlas. Retrieved 2023-01-15.
  4. ↑ Howell, Craig (2023-02-25). "Justice signs battery bill; $105M toward Form Energy plant project in Weirton". The Parkersburg News and Sentinel . Retrieved 2023-11-19.
  5. ↑ "Xcel to install Form's long-duration batteries at retiring coal plants". Canary Media. January 27, 2023. Retrieved 2023-02-02.
  6. ↑ Spector, Julian (21 May 2024). "Now Form Energy is using its battery tech to clean up iron and steel". Canary Media. Retrieved 2024-05-22.
  7. ↑ "The missing piece of the storage puzzle? Multi-day iron-air battery company secures $405M investment". Renewable Energy World. 2024-10-11. Retrieved 2024-10-21.
  8. ↑ "A "Reversible Rust" Battery That Could Transform Energy Storage - ClearPath". clearpath.org. Retrieved 2024-10-21.
  9. 1 2 "Power when the sun doesn't shine". Main. 2024-01-25. Retrieved 2024-10-21.
  10. ↑ "2024 Climate Tech Companies to Watch: Form Energy and its iron batteries". MIT Technology Review. Retrieved 2024-10-21.
  11. ↑ Colthorpe, Andy (16 December 2024). "Li-ion BESS from Fluence, iron-air batteries from Form Energy put through fire testing paces". Energy-Storage.News.
  12. ↑ Clifford, Catherine (2021-08-25). "Stealthy battery company backed by Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos has a lot to prove". CNBC. Retrieved 2024-10-21.
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