<div dir="ltr"><p align="left" style="box-sizing:border-box;font-family:proxima-nova,sans-serif;font-size:20px;line-height:26px;margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:26px"><span lang="en-US" style="box-sizing:border-box">In the Philippines, a solar power home package can be purchased for only around six hundred dollars. Often two of them are enough to power a home. I look forward to being free from the local power grid, where electricity is twice the price it was back in America.</span></p><p align="left" style="box-sizing:border-box;font-family:proxima-nova,sans-serif;font-size:20px;line-height:26px;margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:26px"><span lang="en-US" style="box-sizing:border-box">"Finding a way to store large amounts of energy at low cost will be vital</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box"> if we want to shift our grids to </span><span lang="en-US" style="box-sizing:border-box">renewable energy. </span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">A </span><a href="https://cleantechnica.com/2021/07/24/form-energy-reveals-iron-air-100-hour-storage-battery/" style="box-sizing:border-box;background-color:transparent;color:rgb(237,102,41);text-decoration-line:none"><span lang="en-US" style="box-sizing:border-box">new iron-air battery</span></a><span lang="en-US" style="box-sizing:border-box"> that can deliver power for 100 hours at </span><span lang="en-US" style="box-sizing:border-box">one-tenth</span><span lang="en-US" style="box-sizing:border-box"> the cost of lithium ion</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box"> could be the key.</span></p><p align="left" style="box-sizing:border-box;font-family:proxima-nova,sans-serif;font-size:20px;line-height:26px;margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:26px"><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">R</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">apid improvements in the cost and capacity of lithium-ion batteries </span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">are</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box"> transforming the transport sector, helping <a href="https://singularityhub.com/2021/07/21/this-tiny-electric-car-is-solar-powered-and-costs-6800/" style="box-sizing:border-box;background-color:transparent;color:rgb(237,102,41);text-decoration-line:none">electric vehicles</a> go toe-to-toe with gas-powered cars. Prices have dropped so low that </span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">lithium-ion batteries</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box"> increasingly make sense for large-scale applications, such as </span><a href="https://e360.yale.edu/features/in-boost-for-renewables-grid-scale-battery-storage-is-on-the-rise" style="box-sizing:border-box;background-color:transparent;color:rgb(237,102,41);text-decoration-line:none"><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">storing excess renewable energy</span></a><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box"> for when the sun doesn’t shine or the wind doesn’t blow.</span></p><p align="left" style="box-sizing:border-box;font-family:proxima-nova,sans-serif;font-size:20px;line-height:26px;margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:26px"><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">But there’s one place where they’re still of little use: storing energy for multiple days. Th</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">is</span> <span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">i</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">s crucial, because a grid reliant on large amounts of renewables doesn’t only have to conten</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">d</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box"> with daily variations in sun and wind—</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">a</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box"> major storm can block out the sun or an extended period of calm can bring turbines to a halt for days at a time.</span></p><p align="left" style="box-sizing:border-box;font-family:proxima-nova,sans-serif;font-size:20px;line-height:26px;margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:26px"><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">A secretive startup backed by Bill Gates’ Breakthrough Energy Ventures thinks it may have the answer, though. <a href="https://formenergy.com/" style="box-sizing:border-box;background-color:transparent;color:rgb(237,102,41);text-decoration-line:none">Form Energy</a>, which was co-founded by the creator of Tesla’s Powerwall battery, Mateo Jaramillo, and MIT battery guru Yet-Ming Chiang, has unveiled a new battery design that essentially relies on a process of “reversible rusting” to provide multi-day energy storage at ultra-low costs.</span></p><p align="left" style="box-sizing:border-box;font-family:proxima-nova,sans-serif;font-size:20px;line-height:26px;margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:26px"><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">“With this technology, we are tackling the biggest barrier to deep decarbonization: making renewable energy available when and where it’s needed, even during multiple days of extreme weather or grid outages,” Jaramillo </span><a href="https://formenergy.com/form-energy-unveils-chemistry-of-multi-day-storage-battery-technology/" style="box-sizing:border-box;background-color:transparent;color:rgb(237,102,41);text-decoration-line:none"><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">said in a press release</span></a><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">.</span></p><p align="left" style="box-sizing:border-box;font-family:proxima-nova,sans-serif;font-size:20px;line-height:26px;margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:26px"><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">The company’s batteries are each about the size of a washing machine, </span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">and</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box"> are filled with iron pellets and a water-based electrolyte similar to that used in AA batteries. To discharge, the battery breathes in oxygen from the air, converting the pellets to </span><span lang="en-US" style="box-sizing:border-box">iron oxide, or rust,</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box"> and producing electricity in the process. T</span><span lang="en-US" style="box-sizing:border-box">o charge,</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box"> the application of a current c</span><span lang="en-US" style="box-sizing:border-box">onvert</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">s</span><span lang="en-US" style="box-sizing:border-box"> the rust back into iron and expel</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">s</span><span lang="en-US" style="box-sizing:border-box"> the oxygen.</span></p><p align="left" style="box-sizing:border-box;font-family:proxima-nova,sans-serif;font-size:20px;line-height:26px;margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:26px"><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">The key to their approach is the low cost of the constituent materials. Today’s lithium-ion batteries cost $50 </span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">to</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box"> $80 per kilowatt-hour thanks to the expensive minerals required to make them, like nickel, cobalt, lithium, and manganese. According to the </span><em style="box-sizing:border-box"><a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/startup-claims-breakthrough-in-long-duration-batteries-11626946330?" style="box-sizing:border-box;background-color:transparent;color:rgb(237,102,41);text-decoration-line:none"><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">Wall Street Journal</span></a></em><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">, Form can make theirs for just $20 per kilowatt-hour, and they will be able to provide power for 100 </span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">to</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box"> 150 hours, depending on the configuration.</span></p><p align="left" style="box-sizing:border-box;font-family:proxima-nova,sans-serif;font-size:20px;line-height:26px;margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:26px"><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">That’s significant, because recent </span><a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2542435119303009" style="box-sizing:border-box;background-color:transparent;color:rgb(237,102,41);text-decoration-line:none"><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">research in </span><em style="box-sizing:border-box"><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">Joule</span></em></a> <span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">found that below this cost, the combination of energy storage and renewables could provide reliable baseload power 100 </span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box">percent</span><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box"> of the time in places with abundant renewable energy, like Texas and Arizona, making it possible to completely do away with fossil fuel power plants."</span></p><p align="left" style="box-sizing:border-box;font-family:proxima-nova,sans-serif;font-size:20px;line-height:26px;margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:26px"><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box"><a href="https://singularityhub.com/2021/08/02/form-energys-new-low-cost-iron-based-battery-runs-for-100-hours/">https://singularityhub.com/2021/08/02/form-energys-new-low-cost-iron-based-battery-runs-for-100-hours/</a><br></span></p><p align="left" style="box-sizing:border-box;font-family:proxima-nova,sans-serif;font-size:20px;line-height:26px;margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:26px"><span lang="en-GB" style="box-sizing:border-box"><br></span></p></div>