Gridtential Produces Breakthrough AGM Battery With East Penn Manufacturing

Gridtential Energy – an inventor and developer of Silicon Joule battery technology, has announced it is launching a series of groundbreaking AGM reference batteries produced on East Penn Manufacturing’s prototype line. The first offering is a single-block 24V lead battery optimized for deep-cycle applications. A 12V power version will follow later in Q2 2021, with 48V versions of each appearing in the second half of the year.

Silicon Joule reference batteries are designed for lab and field testing, allowing battery manufacturers and OEMs to experience the benefits of Gridtential’s patented AGM technology. Silicon Joule batteries enable manufacturers to move directly from prototype to mass production, with 90 percent of the required equipment already in use in their factories.

While conventional lead-battery designs allowed for 6V and 12V monoblock configurations, until now 24V and higher voltage configurations were not commercially practical. OEMs had to combine lower-voltage batteries to achieve higher voltages, increasing their costs and introducing points of failure.

Gridtential stated that it cracked the problem with Silicon Joule, a revolutionary battery technology that substitutes treated silicon wafers for conventional lead grids and combines them using a patented “stack-and-seal” architecture that provides uniform current distribution and efficient thermal management, minimizing failure modes like sulfation, corrosion and grid growth.

The result is an advanced AGM lead battery that delivers up to 5X the power density, 2X the discharge rate at a 75 percent lower levelised cost of electricity (LCOE) than conventional lead batteries, offering high-performance at significantly lower weight, creating an attractive alternative to lithium-ion.

Unlike lithium-ion, Silicon Joule batteries are thermally stable and 99 percent recyclable in facilities around the world. And thanks to their flexible stacked architecture, they can accommodate a wide range of voltage configurations, including 12V, 24V, 36V and even 48V in a monoblock form factor.

Silicon Joule’s performance, long life and flexibility as per the firms claims make it well-suited to a wide range of energy-storage applications, from personal mobility to home energy storage to hybrid automotive:

• 24V deep-cycle (available now): electric sweepers, scooters, wheelchairs, riding lawn mowers, e-bikes
• 12V power (available Q2 2021): power-sports SLI, automotive start-stop and EV auxiliary
• 48V deep-cycle (available 2H 2021): golf carts, e-tuktuks, renewable energy storage, telecom, data center backup, micro-grid
• 48V power (available 2H 2021): mild-hybrid, EV auxiliary, ADAS, start-stop, infotainment and regenerative braking.

“Global electrification is the future. But to get there, the world needs a better battery—one that’s ready for production and leverages today’s manufacturing infrastructure. With our new reference batteries, made with a world-class partner, manufacturers and OEMs can see for themselves that Silicon Joule is the answer they’ve been looking for,” said Gridtential CEO John Barton.