TerraScale to leverage Ambri liquid metal battery technology at Reno data centre campus

Ambri batteries utilise a calcium-antimony based on innovative cell chemistry developed at MIT

US-based clean infrastructure design and development firm TerraScale has announced plans to use liquid metal battery technology from Ambri at its upcoming data centre campus in Nevada, US.

As part of the agreement, TerraScale and its data centre development partners will integrate a 250MWh Ambri energy storage system at the 3700-acre Energos Reno project.

Ambri batteries utilise a calcium-antimony based on cell chemistry developed at MIT. The company counts Bill Gates, Khosla Ventures and TOTAL SE among its investors.

The company claims its long-duration systems based on the patented chemistry deliver daily 100 percent depth of discharge cycling performance for more than 20 years, with negligible degradation and significantly lower system cost than other battery storage technologies.

Systems built with Ambri cells can also operate safely in a range of environmental conditions without air conditioning or fire suppression equipment, also helping system efficiency and project and maintenance costs.

“The collaboration is underway and includes delivery of 250 MWh of Ambri systems to TerraScale’s first project in Reno, Nevada starting in 2021,” said Adam Briggs, Ambri’s Chief Commercial Officer.

“The Ambri systems are particularly well suited for the project’s high-desert operations, for the shifting of its large amounts of renewable solar load, and for its grid-system peak shaving capability.”

Terrascale’s Energos project in Reno, aimed at enabling secure storage and transmission of data between government agencies and commercial clients, will comprise a scalable data centre leveraging 500MW of on-site renewable power when completed.

Initial development of a fiber optic trunk line, 23MW of geothermal power and 10MW of solar power infrastructure is complete. Work on the planned 20MW-100MW modular data centre is set to begin in 2021, along with rail and road infrastructure to better connect the US supply chain.

“Our data centre technology partners are looking forward to deploying Ambri’s technology to enable high-volume, reliable, and resilient energy storage with potentially the lowest levelized cost of storage in the industry,” said Danny Hayes, Chief Executive Officer, TerraScale.