Australian Vanadium has hit a milestone with its wholly-owned subsidiary VSUN Energy selling the first standalone vanadium flow battery system to a residential customer.
The customer in regional Western Australia acquired the standalone power system (SPS) due to the high cost of connecting to the grid and lack of reliable power in the region.
Australian Vanadium (ASX:AVL) added that the vanadium redox flow battery (VRFB) system was selected due to its particular strengths of reliability, depth of discharge, safety and longevity.
The VRFB was provided by Singapore-based manufacturer V-Flow Tech.
VRFBs are generally considered to be safer and longer lasting than lithium-ion batteries.
Their credentials for large scale systems are also well established.
“The requirements of an SPS suit the strengths of the VRFB perfectly,” VSUN director and Australian Vanadium managing director Vincent Algar explained.
“It is a robust piece of equipment that can be cycled repeatedly without degradation in performance. Its high-temperature tolerance makes it ideal for the Australian environment and being non-flammable means that there’s no risk of it causing a bushfire.
“We are pleased to be kicking off our relationship with V-Flow with this new sale and assisting the growth of the VRFB market in the Australian and the South-East Asian regions.”
He added that while the current residential battery market is focused on deploying short-life systems such as lead acid and lithium-ion batteries, VSUN is offering smaller, more modular VRFBs that are safer, have longer asset lives and are more environmentally friendly overall.
Vanadium SPS
The SPS sold to the customer is a 5 kilowatt/30 kilowatt (kWh) hour VRFB paired with 12kWh of solar photovoltaic panels and a diesel backup system.
It is designed to provide the microgrid with an uninterrupted, clean and safe source of energy primarily supplied by direct and stored solar energy.
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