Reliance new Energy Ltd (RNESL), a wholly owned subsidiary of Reliance Industries Ltd. (RIL), has announced investment of $50 million in Ambri Inc – an energy-storage company in Massachusetts, USA. This investment is part of a consortium of investors including Bill Gates, Paulson & Co. among others, totalling to $144 million.
According to company sources, the investment has been carried out to help the company commercialise and grow its long-duration energy storage systems business, globally. RNESL will scoop up 42.3 million shares of preferred stock in Ambri for its investment in the company.
Ambri’s long duration energy storage systems are based on patented technology and designed to last between 4-24 hours. Amnri’s innovations are widely believed to be breakthroughs in cost, longevity and safety barriers linked with Lithium-ion batteries used in grid-scale storage applications. This will support storage for increasing amounts of renewable energy as they get integrated into electric grids.
RNESL and Ambri may also collaborate and set up a large-scale battery manufacturing facility in India which may add scale and bring down costs for Reliance’s green energy initiative.
Earlier this year in June, Mukesh Ambani had announced Reliance Industries’ plans towards a major renewable energy foray. Part of the plan is setting up a Giga Factory in Jamnagar to store intermittent energy. This is to be a part of the Dhirubhai Ambani Green Energy Giga Complex project.
“We are exploring new and advanced electro-chemical technologies that can be used for large-scale grid batteries to store the energy. We will collaborate with global leaders in battery technology to achieve highest reliability for round-the-clock power availability through a combination of generation, storage, and grid connectivity,” Ambani had announced.
Ambri’s systems can support energy storage in the range of 10MWh to 2GWh.The company will manufacture Calcium and Antimony electrode-based cells and containerised systems.
The Ambri systems are expected to be more economical than Lithium-ion batteries and are claimed to be capable of operating safely in any varied climate conditions.
They claim to not require supplemental air conditioning and can last for over 20 years with minimal degradation.
