Energy Dome CO2 Battery facility in Sardinia, the second-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after Sicily, and one of the 20 regions of Italy, has been officially launched.
Developed by Energy Dome, an Italian company with revolutionary technology for large scale and long duration energy storage, the project which is the company’s first in the region represents the final de-risking of CO2 Battery technology as Energy Dome enters the commercial scaling stage, being the market’s first commercial long-duration energy storage technology providing a reliable alternative to fossil fuels for dispatchable baseload power worldwide.
Operationalization of the Energy Dome CO2 Battery facility in Sardinia
The Energy Dome CO2 battery uses carbon dioxide to store and quickly release renewable energy such as solar and wind energy. According to Energy Dome, the technology can be applied quickly anywhere in the world for less than half the cost of comparable-sized lithium battery storage facilities.
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The CO2 Battery model is based on a closed-loop thermodynamic system that holds energy efficiently by manipulating CO2 under various state conditions. In charging mode, CO2 is compressed and stored at ambient temperature under pressure in a high-density supercritical or liquid state. In discharging mode, CO2 is expanded into a turbine and stored back into an atmospheric gasholder before being released to the grid in a closed-loop system with zero emissions to the atmosphere.
Within a few years, the battery could offer a Levelised Cost Of Storage (LCOS) as low as US$50-60 per MWh, whereas lithium batteries cost between US$132-245/MWh. Furthermore, Energy Dome’s thermodynamic liquid-CO2 system has a round-trip efficiency of 75-80%, which is higher than any other long-duration energy storage technology on the market today, including liquid-air, compressed-air, and gravity-based solutions.
Construction of first full-scale 20MW-200MWh Energy Dome CO2 battery plant underway
Energy Dome is currently constructing its first full-scale 20MW-200MWh plant, the commercial operation of which is expected to start by the end of 2023.
Multiple commercial agreements have already been signed, including one with the Italian utility A2A for the construction of the first 20MW-5h facility. Energy Dome also signed a non-exclusive license agreement with Ansaldo Energia, a major provider of power generation plants and components, earlier this year to construct long-duration energy storage schemes in Italy, Germany, the Middle East, and Africa.
