SBIR Phase II: Rechargeable Carbon-Oxygen Battery for Ultra-Low-Cost Renewable Energy Storage

The broader impact/commercial potential of this SBIR Phase II project is a new ultra low-cost carbon-oxygen battery that provides high energy density long-duration storage with unique fundamental properties needed to enable 100% renewable energy. This closed-loop stationary energy storage system will turn intermittent solar/wind power into on-demand power at lower cost than fossil fuel generation. Additionally, its high energy density (3x lighter and smaller than Lithium-ion batteries at system level) will enable longer range electric ships, trucks, etc. – a secondary target market – and a much more compact size for stationary storage than other batteries at the same energy capacity. The project will provide insight into the scale-up potential and design parameters of key battery components. Achieving 100% sustainable energy will have a wide range of societal impacts including minimizing environmental impact and improving human health. This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project for the carbon-oxygen battery will thus focus on key technology development of the core components by modeling, building, and testing. This will involve assembling an array of small-scale prototype reactors to screen configurations and iterate on the design, followed by scale up to a larger megawatt-hour (MWh) scale reactors to integrate into a demo system. The objectives of the Phase II project will focus on optimizing the reactor to achieve the key target metrics, including objectives to: 1) create and validate a multi-physics model of the optimized reactor, 2) design the optimized reactor, operating conditions, and materials, and 3) build and test several optimized reactors and show that the best design has the potential to fulfill the target metrics. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.