From pv magazine 3/25
Renewables executives are trying to read the runes for the new U.S. administration. Given the nature of events, it is perhaps not surprising to learn the chief executive of one U.S. battery manufacturer has been emphasizing his company’s use of fossil fuel industry materials.
“We use benzene and xylene, or you can get it from coal-tar chemicals,” said Eugene Beh, CEO of Californian startup Quino Energy, discussing the electrolyte in his company’s flow batteries.
While stressing Quino doesn’t burn fossil fuels, Beh takes a different approach to clean energy peers shying away from President Trump’s “drill baby, drill” messaging.
Quino produces what is effectively a vanadium flow battery (VFB) but using a quinone-based electrolyte instead of vanadium. With China producing 68,000 metric tons (MT) of vanadium in 2024, and Russia (20,000 MT) – streets ahead of third-placed producer South Africa (9,100 MT) – Beh reckons his company can tick boxes for the new administration.
“We’re able to use vanadium systems but featuring our own, organic electrolyte which can be easily made in America. And it’s probably about a quarter of the cost of vanadium so what’s not to like?” he said. “Energy infrastructure made in the USA, I would think, has a lot going for it.”
Matt Harper, Canada-based president and chief commercial officer (CCO) of British VFB maker Invinity Energy Systems, also pointed to fossil-fuel industry connections. He cited work by Arkansas-based U.S. Vanadium to refine petrochemical waste from the Gulf Coast and blend it into the vanadium electrolyte used in VFBs. “This solution not only has the potential to be very low cost but reinforces the sustainable aspect of VFB production,” said Harper.
Beh added that U.S. President Donald Trump has consistently prioritized America first, along with protectionist policies. The Quino CEO noted his company could use renewably sourced wood tar in its electrolyte. “There’s something about our technology which I think any administration could get behind,” he said. “I sleep a lot better at night than some of the other battery executives out there.”
Market strength
American renewables businesses, and global exporters, have sought to reassure investors by pointing to the success solar enjoyed during the president’s previous term. The economics for solar stack up in a free-market environment. If solar is safe, energy storage should be too, according to Beh.
Harper agreed. “Solar power is, by a considerable margin, the least-cost form of generation in the U.S. right now,” he said. “We see a need for massive [electricity] loads from data centers in California and Nevada over the next 10 years. The lowest-cost way of supplying those data centers with energy is from solar and that means we need some form of grid balancing.”
The Invinity executive highlighted the pro-America chops of a business born from the merger of U.S.-based Avalon Battery and the United Kingdom’s redT energy in 2020. “The logic that works is creating American jobs, providing a platform for a US economy that is globally competitive,” said Harper. “We feel that we fit pretty squarely into that bracket.”
There are vanadium resources in North America, too. China, Russia, South Africa, and Brazil may dominate production but Harper cited the Gibellini vanadium extraction project in Nevada and the Lac Dore site in Quebec, Canada. He accepted, however, the second Trump administration could bring speed bumps.
“We must expect the unexpected and might need to be nimble and roll with the punches under the Trump administration but we believe there’s a great need for our products,” said Harper. “We believe that no matter what tariffs or other regimes come in, we’ll be able to take on, and develop, and adapt to the market in a reasonable way. Our first factory was in California and it may be that we use those capabilities to deliver products into the U.S.”
Flow batteries
The energy storage executives agreed that discussion about whether flow batteries can challenge the market dominance of lithium-ion devices is misleading. That’s not comparing apples with apples.
“What I don’t think we’re likely to do is replace lithium in the bulk of the installations that have been delivered in the last five years,” said Harper. “Most of those have been primarily about regulating [electricity] capacity on the grid and replacing capacity … That’s not what we’re focused on.”
The longer duration storage capacity offered by flow batteries means they can even out electricity supply, chiefly from renewables, into secure baseload. Just as importantly, flow batteries don’t catch fire.
Harper referred to the recent five-day battery blaze at Moss Landing, California, as an example of a safety challenge posed by lithium-ion batteries.
“In a big area of desert are you going to be worried one of your batteries is going to go up in smoke? Probably not,” he said. “For a mission-critical battery at a data center, that level of safety is probably much more important. Our technology, at its core, is fundamentally non-flammable.”
Beh added, even the lithium ferro-phosphate devices trailed by battery suppliers as less of a fire risk have suffered high-profile blazes in China. “I don’t know of any flow batteries anywhere in the world that have caught fire,” said the CEO.
Flow battery units don’t have to be spaced apart to mitigate fire risk, meaning they can be deployed in locations where lithium-ion units can’t, Beh explained. He added that in terms of energy-to-plant-area, flow batteries can be three to four times more energy dense than lithium systems.
Such site flexibility ties in with another argument for Quino’s products: The startup’s systems can be installed in the huge carbon-steel tanks used to store oil which are common across the United States.
Quino has cited an estimate by the International Energy Agency that the nation’s oil tanks could house 4 TWh of energy storage capacity if all were equipped with the company’s aqueous organic quinone redox flow batteries. How many of those tanks will be available if US oil production ramps up, though?
Oil tank usage
Beh pointed to historic data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration indicating around 60% of the nation’s oil storage capacity was available. There is also the fact not all the tanks are owned by the oil industry, many are on leased sites where owners might be grateful for a non-flammable use of their facilities, and “perhaps with ancillary benefits such as payments from utilities,” the Quino Energy boss added.
What is clear is the market potential for flow batteries, whether housed in cheaper, pre-existing oil storage tanks, or based on the more mature vanadium technology. Harper cited a U.S. Department of Energy estimate that long-duration energy storage (LDES) sites will be delivering three times as much electricity as lithium-ion batteries by 2040.
“Baseload power is less expensive than [grid] peaking capacity so there will be a lot of value still being delivered by lithium,” said Harper. “Based on technologies on the grid right now, we are one of a very small number of LDES technologies that’s performing at scale … In terms of technologies operating today, we’re going to be in pole position.”
Beh was also optimistic about his company’s prospects, in part because of Quino’s ability to produce a “Made in America” electrolyte.
“My estimate is that, outside of China, which has its own vanadium supply, I wouldn’t be surprised if our technology was 80% of flow battery technology by 2030,” he said. “I’d say 20% of the China market might be realistic for our type of technology.”
On the question of how life could be under Trump, Beh was optimistic: “To me, there’s plenty of opportunities for growth in the next four years and then beyond that. The flow battery market is still so small that we probably won’t be affected.”
