Energy Vault Holdings Inc (NYSE:NRGV) on Tuesday announced the start of commissioning of the world’s first grid-scale EVx gravity energy storage system (GESS), located in China.
With a capacity of 25 MW/100 MWh, the facility was built outside of Shanghai in Rudong, Jiangsu Province, in partnership with Atlas Renewable and China Tianying (CNTY). It is adjacent to an existing wind farm and its purpose is to augment and balance the Chinese national energy grid.
Mechanical completion of the system’s critical power electronic components has already been achieved and the facility is expected to be fully interconnected to the state utility grid in the fourth quarter of 2023. The round trip efficiency (RTE) of the grid-scale EVx GESS is seen at more than 80% compared to 75% for the first 5-MW EV1 Tower that was commissioned in Switzerland in mid-2020, the developer said.
“While this represents a significant milestone, our work in China is just beginning given recent local announcements of multi-GW hours of gravity energy storage buildouts, including projects announced in 2022 supporting China’s ‘Zero-carbon parks’ initiative with Energy Vault’s gravity energy storage technology,” commented Robert Piconi, chairman and CEO of Energy Vault.
An example of an additional project in China is last week’s announcement by a China Tianying subsidiary about the signing of a deal with the government of Huailai County, Hebei Province, for a 100-MWh gravity energy storage project.
