There’s an upsurge in interest in vanadium flow batteries, containing vanadium ions in different states of oxidation. Vanadium redox flow batteries, to use their full name, have positive and negative tanks of liquid electrolyte, with an ion-exchange membrane between. They are a compelling solution for grid-scale bulk energy storage, for reasons we explore below.
Reasons For Renewed Interest in Vanadium Redox Flow
Flow batteries upscale readily by adding additional pairs of tanks. The electrolytes are non-flammable, giving the technology a long, safe life of twenty years or more. They also have the advantage that we can fully discharge them indefinitely, without damaging their components and materials.
The upsurge in interest in vanadium flow batteries is partly due to their simplicity of operation:
- Electrical energy converts their vanadium ions to higher oxidation states as we charge them.
- A reverse reaction releases the electrical energy though the electrodes, when we discharge them.
Fresh Study Hints at Renewed Interest in Vanadium
A fresh study, which we link to below, reports growing interest in vanadium flow batteries. This is not unexpected, given their ability to deliver 10,000 to 20,000 discharge-recharge cycles.
The study goes on to predict a ten-fold increase in the upsurge in vanadium flow batteries in the next five years. This could translate to a growth from four gigawatt-hours, to forty gigawatt-hours grid storage by 2030.
What’s Behind The Upsurge In Vanadium Flow Batteries
Vanadium redox flow batteries have a number of advantages that are hard to beat. Their combination of safety, longevity, and recyclability is compelling. Their electrolytes are close to 100% recoverable too, enabling circular battery lives.
Equally intriguing, the manufacturing cost of vanadium flow batteries is falling sharply. Their current cost of $380 per kilowatt-hour is set to fall to $230 by 2030, according to the same study. We shall watch this story with interest.
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