Energy Vault, Atlas Renewable and China Tianying have started construction of a 100 megawatt-hour gravity-based storage system adjacent to a wind farm and national grid site at Rudong in Jiangsu province, China.
The EVx system, the first to be deployed in the country, will help augment and balance China’s national energy grid through the delivery of renewable energy to the State Grid Corporation of China.
Commencement of EVx construction follows a previously announced license and royalty agreement for renewable energy storage in partnership with Houston-based Atlas Renewable and its majority investor China Tianying.
Energy Vault chairman, co-founder and chief executive Robert Piconi said: “Our first commercial EVx deployment in China is a significant milestone for Energy Vault and for the People’s Republic of China as it pursues its decarbonisation goals.
“China is rapidly expanding its use of renewable energy coupled with annual energy storage mandates in order to meet its decarbonization goals.
“We are very pleased that EVx and our energy management software platform have already received local regulatory endorsement and is being deployed now as a critical enabling technology to support China’s energy transition and carbon neutrality goals.
“In 2021, China produced more metric tons of greenhouse gasses than the next four largest countries combined, and as currently planned, will continue to increase emissions until 2030.
“We must move swiftly to reverse this trend, and together with local partners China Tianying and Atlas Renewable, we will do just that.”
Atlas Renewable chief executive Eric Fang said: “The world’s first deployment of Energy Vault’s transformative EVx technology is taking place in China and it represents US and Chinese collaboration in its best form.
“The world’s two largest economies have joined forces to meaningfully address climate change with breakthrough, innovative technology that will play a critical role in enabling China’s clean energy transition and 30-60 policy.
“This project clearly demonstrates the seriousness with which China takes its COP26 commitments and will serve as a model for global decarbonisation.”
China Tianying chairman Yan said: “The achievement of the Rudong project, will be historically noteworthy, as a path forward, enabled by both Chinese and American private business working together cooperatively and effectively, for a common climate goal: non carbon based energy storage that fully completes the energy production and use cycle of renewable electric power generated from non-carbon sources.”
Energy Vault’s gravity-based solutions are based on the physics and mechanical engineering fundamentals of pumped hydroelectric energy storage, but replace water with custom-made composite blocks that can be made from low-cost and locally sourced materials, including local soil, mine tailings, coal combustion residuals (coal ash), and end-of-life decommissioned wind turbine blades.