A Hong Kong-based billionaire property developer has founded a new startup that is focused on adapting technology used on spacecrafts for energy storage here on Earth, Interesting Engineering reported.
Peter Lee is the co-chairman of Henderson Land Development Co. Ltd., a multi-billion-dollar real estate company that he (along with his brother) inherited from their father. Both the elder and younger Lees have reportedly developed reputations as big-time philanthropists, which has led Peter to allocate some of his massive fortune to clean energy research and development.
Peter Lee's newly founded EnerVenue is looking at the nickel-hydrogen batteries used to store energy in space and seeing if they can replace the mainstream lithium-ion batteries here on Earth.
While lithium-ion batteries have become the norm for battery-electric vehicles, they are not ideal for long-term energy storage — such as, for example, storing energy harvested from solar farms. They are also not ideal from an environmental perspective. The lithium required to power them is very rare, and mining for it causes immense environmental harm and wastes huge amounts of water. (The net total environmental damage is still much less than that of oil and gas drilling, it is worth noting.)
While many scientists are looking at ways to improve the efficiency of lithium-ion batteries, others are looking into replacements. Nickel-hydrogen batteries could be one option. The batteries have a lifespan of around 30 years (compared to two to three years for lithium-ion ones) and are also fireproof and 90% recyclable.
EnerVenue is already building a 1 gigawatt-hour energy storage factory at Changzhou in the Jiangsu province in China and has plans for a 10 gigawatt-hour facility in either China or the United States.
One downside to nickel-hydrogen batteries is that nickel mining, like lithium mining, is very bad for the environment. Like lithium mining, it involves planet-overheating pollution, water overuse, and contaminates nearby water sources. However, since lithium-ion batteries also contain nickel (as well as cobalt, aluminum, and manganese), it does seem like the nickel-hydrogen ones might still be a net improvement.
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