American Vanadium Breaks into Energy Storage, Boosts Renewables
An interview with American Vanadium's CEO, Bill Radvak
Vanadium—a rare earth metal traditionally used as an additive to strengthen steel—is well on its way to playing an even more critical role in its potential use in mass energy storage as next generation lithium-vanadium-flow batteries (VFBs) become the next big thing. The same metal Henry Ford used to strengthen his Model T cars on the outside, revolutionizing the auto industry, has a newfound ability to strengthen cars on the inside through better performing batteries in electric cars.
A Critical Resource
The “green metal” has been used for decades to strengthen and reduce the amount of steel needed in the construction and auto making industries. It's also used to make titanium alloys, an irreplaceable element depended upon in the aerospace industry. Adding small quantities of vanadium to steel results in environmental savings including an overall reduction in iron ore mined, which, in turn, leads to less iron smelted, refined and shipped.
Today, vanadium is getting more attention from its unexpected potential to serve as the “missing link” in the renewable energy industry. VFBs bear the power to provide high volume energy storage for electricity generated by intermittent sources like solar and wind power installations. With an efficiency rating of about 90 percent, VFBs last 20 years or more and can release massive amounts of electricity when needed, while storing energy when demand is low. Unlike lithium, vanadium does not produce profuse amounts of ambient heat while charging, and is truly scalable—capable of meeting the demands of a single home to an entire power grid.
What's more, the super metal may also serve as a gamechanger in the electric vehicle battery industry. Lithium-vanadium-phosphate batteries have been proven to provide high energy density and voltage, translating to more miles per charge and significantly less charge time. Not to mention, it's less expensive compared to the alternatives currently used in the industry.
So what's the problem?
Two major factors have held back the vanadium breakthrough we're about to see: a lack of attention and high-quality supply. Until just recently, attention has been zoned in on scaling up the renewable energy industry, leaving behind an equally important variable to its success: efficiently storing and distributing that energy. Thus, funding initiatives have historically favored the development of mass renewable energy systems over energy storage technologies—a real chicken-or-egg type scenario. Secondly, supply is limited, mined and sold only in Russia, South Africa and China, where vanadium is starting to be suspected of being hoarded as demand increases. Until now...
American Vanadium, a Canadian metals exploration company, owns the rights to North America's first and only primary producer of vanadium, with full intentions of breaking into the energy storage industry at full speed. The Gibellini mine in Nevada, 350 miles north of Las Vegas, has the capacity to produce 14 million pounds of vanadium pentoxide, about half of the total vanadium consumed in North America. Due to the unique geology of its location, the mine has the potential to become the world's lowest-cost primary vanadium producer, says the company's CEO Bill Radvak.
“We're able to produce the very high purity electrolyte required for these types of batteries at a globally competitive cost,” says Radvak. “The vanadium mined in other parts of the world—China, Russia and South Africa—is mostly suitable for the steel industry. Very little of it can actually go towards energy storage technology, so we're in a very strong position globally.”
It wasn't until roughly one year ago that the company decided to take that unique approach, moving away from providing quality premium vanadium products for steelmaking to essentially driving the energy storage business in the US.
“It's a big shift,” says Radvak. “We saw where the world was going and we understand the power of our deposit.
“If we would have just sat back, hoping VFBs would develop over time, we wouldn't be building on the deposit in enough time for us to capitalize on it,” he explains unapologetically.
Shifting Industry
The company is in talks with battery leaders involved in VFB development under the proposition that American Vanadium will provide long term stability in the price of the metal for a piece of the battery business. Since vanadium is such a massive component of a VFB, solving the issue of vanadium's volatile price and limited supply is key for any battery developer breaking into the multi-billion dollar industry.
“If you're planning on having a sizable energy storage business, you can't risk relying on the open market,” says Radvak. “We're hoping to leverage that supply, rather than just selling it, to maximize what we can get as an electrolyte supply and we're more than ready to give up some of that extra profit if we can be a part of the battery business.”
That move will not only make VFB development more stable for both parties involved, but also actually give it the chance to be a successful technology in America in the near future, which is expected to go commercial as soon as this year. Under a recently announced memorandum of understanding with GILDEMEISTER energy solutions of Germany—a world leader in integrated energy solutions for the production, storage and utilization of renewables—the two companies will work together to become a leading provider of energy storage and micro grid solutions in North America.
“Storage is a tremendously huge market and the route we've taken presents a great opportunity,” says Radvak. “It's an exciting space in which we're ecstatic to be able to play such an important role.”
