PNNL and WSU researchers have improved the performance and life cycle of sodium-ion battery technology to narrow the gap with some lithium-ion batteries.
PNNL’s Patrick Balducci delivered an information-packed tutorial on grid energy storage valuation at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California.
Researchers at PNNL have come up with a novel way to use silicon as an energy storage ingredient, replacing the graphite in electrodes. Silicon can hold 10 times the electrical charge per gram, but it comes with problems of its own.
The Energy Storage System Safety and Reliability Forum at PNNL brought together more than 120 energy storage experts from the U.S. Department of Energy, the national laboratories, utilities, industry and academia.
PNNL will lead three new grid modernization projects funded by the Department of Energy. The projects focus on scalability and usability, networked microgrids, and machine learning for a more resilient, flexible and secure power grid.
Scientists have uncovered a root cause of the growth of needle-like structures—known as dendrites and whiskers—that plague lithium batteries, sometimes causing a short circuit, failure, or even a fire.
With support from DOE’s Office of Electricity and National Grid, PNNL led a groundbreaking study to accurately assess the full value of grid energy storage investments across a wide variety of use cases.
PNNL researchers have created a chemical cocktail that could help electric cars power their way through extreme temperatures where current lithium-ion batteries don’t operate as efficiently as needed.
Energy storage is slowly shifting utility planning practices from the current paradigm, which ensures grid reliability by building reserve generation resources, to ensuring grid reliability by optimizing grid services.
PNNL researchers demonstrate how the excitation of oxygen atoms that contributes to better performance of a lithium-ion battery also triggers a process that leads to damage, explaining a phenomenon that has been a mystery to scientists.