The latest Investing Matters Podcast with Jean Roche, Co-Manager of Schroder UK Mid Cap Investment Trust has just been released. Listen here.
Think I am right to suggest that BMN should be able to supply electrolyte from Autumn 22 if plant build is on schedule.
This is new (and massive) right?
https://twitter.com/chrishollis999/status/1454381605687070723?s=21
https://www.ft.com/content/b4a19cf5-9ddc-4705-85f2-a51b4cc4ded8
Yep, BMN a leaky bucket - news on its way for sure
This interview is pure dynamite. Anyone new to BMN needs to watch. If fact, everyone needs to watch. Most positive set of comments I have ever seen on vanadium, vrfb, structural deficit and electrolyte from some of the biggest players in the industry.
Costs down. Production up. Growth potential huge.
Pretty simple really.
...The latest support includes funding and management of selected projects through the Advanced Manufacturing Office at the DOEs Office of Energy Efficency and Renewable Energy, while final testing and validation at various US national laboratories will also be paid for. Each funded project targets the grid-scale or industrial energy storage market segment.
Recipients of the US$17.9 million funding are:
Largo Clean Energy: Primary vanadium producer Largo Resources has set up Largo Clean Energy, its Massachusetts-headquartered subsidiary focused on creating a vertically-integrated flow battery business. The company and its partners will receive US$4.9 million to develop and demonstrate manufacturing processes for affordable grid-scale flow batteries.
TreadStone Technologies: The New Jersey-headquartered company is developing technologies for manufacturing electrodes and bipolar plates for flow batteries. TreadStone and its partners will receive US$4.99 million the biggest share of the new funding revealed yesterday.
OTORO Energy: Colorado-headquartered OTORO Energy and its partners will receive US$4.14 million to progress the novel metal chelate flow battery technology the company has developed. OTORO claims its non-vanadium electrolyte flow battery can come in at lower cost than competitors batteries, using abundant, mass-produced materials.
Quino Energy: US$4.58 million goes to California-headquartered Quino Energy and its partners for its R&D into making a scalable and cost-effective production process for aqueous organic flow battery reactants.
Four flow battery manufacturing research and development (R&D) projects will each receive a share of US$17.9 million funding from the US Department of Energy (DoE).
The Department announced its investment into the projects yesterday, aimed at helping to commercialise and scale-up cost-effective long-duration energy storage technologies.
At the same time, the DOE said it is offering US$9 million of financial support to provide fairer access to energy storage for low-income communities.
Through the Energy Storage for Social Equity Initiative, communities will be able to apply for expert assistance to assess whether energy storage can help them make their homes and infrastructure more resilient while lowering their energy costs.
Energy Storage Grand Challenge funding for flow
The R&D funding awards are part of the DOEs Energy Storage Grand Challenge, a competitive funding opportunity for companies developing ways to help meet a growing need for cheap and effective multi-hour energy storage technologies. The UKs government has since followed suit with its own 68 million (US$96.12 million) long-duration energy storage innovation competition.
Through the Challenge, the DOE has set a goal for cost reduction in long-duration storage of 90% by 2030, called the Long Duration Storage Shot and analogous to the Sunshot Initiative which was so instrumental in lowering the cost of solar energy in the US a few years back.
The DOE is also helping to get a US$75 million long-duration energy storage research centre built at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, which is expected to open by or during 2025. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm famously expressed a view earlier this year that flow batteries are good for grid storage, and these enthusiastic words appear to be carrying over into action.
The resident shorter has moved on?
I remain excited for RichKen’s £1 Christmas party.
My dinner suit has been in its dry cleaning wrapper since 2019.
I hope I can still get into it, when the time comes.
...Several miners such as Gold Fields; Bushveld Minerals, a producer of battery metal vanadium; and gold producer Pan African Resources have sought to complement their allocations from Eskom with renewable energy solutions.
The platinum sectorwhich accounted for about 9.3% of exports in 2019, according to Santanderis also looking to renewable energy, with top four miners Anglo American Platinum, Sibanye Stillwater, and Impala Platinum to the fore. South Africa is the biggest platinum miner on a country basis by volume. Sibanye also has its eyes on the battery metal sector, with investments in nickel, lithium, and critical minerals.
Another potential buyer for renewable energy not produced by Eskom is South Africa's biggest city by population, Cape Town. The city government on 13 July issued a tender seeking financial backing for renewable energy projects. Bids are due 27 August.
"The city has always believed that local governments have the constitutional power and obligation to procure renewable energy, and this is necessary to move away from the sole reliance on Eskom for energy supply," Councillor Phindile Maxiti, who has an energy and climate brief, said when the tender was announced.
A South African government renewable electricity request for proposals (RFP) attracted 102 bids from potential project developers, Department of Mineral Resources and Energy (DMRE) data revealed.
The RFP was the fifth phase of the government's Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme, now in its 10th year, which aims to increase the size and reliability of the country's generation fleet as well as decrease South Africa's GHG emissions.
Tenders for renewable power have also been issued by companies and municipal authorities seeking to decarbonize and increase the reliability of their power supplies.
Of the 102 bids in the latest government RFP, 63 involve solar photovoltaic (PV) projects and 39 are onshore wind proposals, the data show. The DMRE declined to comment 23 August on how much combined capacity was submitted into the 2.6-GW tender.
Technology allocations in the tender were split into 1.6 GW of onshore wind and 1 GW of solar PV capacity. Bids were due 16 August. The government will announce the preferred bidders in October or November, with financial close expected in February or March 2022, and commercial operations to begin 24 months later, DMRE said.
"Strong" response
The level of response was strong, Kiren Maharaj, chairperson of the South Africa National Energy Association, a trade body, told Net-Zero Business Daily, adding that she expected the capacity target of the tender to be fully subscribed, if not oversubscribed.
It’s nearly worth buying every stock they decide to short!
It’s as if whoever took the big short position earlier in the week knew there was a big share disposal coming.
But that’s too far-fetched to be true, isn’t it
My thoughts exactly. His tone is usually cautious and his assessments are usually filled with caveats. Not this interview. Something has changed. We may get an RNS or two this week.