Reliance Industries, along with other strategic investors like Paulson & Co Inc and tech mogul Bill Gates, has invested $ 144 million in US-based energy storage company Ambri Inc, the former announced late Monday in a statement.
The Mukesh Ambani-led conglomerate, through its subsidiary Reliance New Energy Solar Ltd (RNESL), has invested $ 50 million to acquire 42.3 million shares of preferred stock in Ambri. The transaction is in line with RIL’s strategic plan to invest Rs 75,000 crore over the next three years to build a new clean energy business to fuel its commitment to be net carbon neutral by 2035.
“RNESL and Ambri are also in discussions for an exclusive collaboration to set up a large scale battery manufacturing facility in India, which could add scale and further bring down costs for Reliance’s green energy initiative,” RIL said in the statement.
Ambri has patented technology and designs with which it manufactures long duration energy storage systems that can last between 4-24 hours. The company can cater to projects that require energy storage systems from 10 megawatts hour to over two gigawatts hour, making it suitable for high-usage applications, such as shifting energy from daytime solar generation to evening and morning peak load times.
India aims to scale up its renewable energy capacity to 450 gigawatts by 2030, of which a majority 60% would be from solar power. While the country adds renewable capacity, it has a huge need to build back up power which can be supplied when the renewable power is not available. Typically, countries use gas-based and hydro power to reduce the intermittency inherent to renewable power, but India has not been able to build these capacities and utility scale batteries may help fill this gap.
Ambri’s energy storage systems will break through the cost, longevity and safety barriers associated with lithium-ion batteries used in grid-scale stationary storage applications and will enable a crucial energy storage solution capable of supporting the increasing amounts of renewable energy being integrated into electric power grids, RIL said.
Ambri will manufacture calcium and antimony electrode-based cells and containerised systems that are more economical than lithium-ion batteries, capable of operating safely in any climatic condition without requiring supplemental air conditioning and meant to last for over 20 years with minimal degradation. The company is securing customers for large-scale projects with commercial operation in 2023 and beyond.
Chairman Mukesh Ambani told shareholders at the company’s Annual General Meet in June that RIL will transform its legacy business into a sustainable, circular and net zero carbon materials business resulting in a “multi-decade growth path” for the company. A twin strategy will aim at decarbonising and repurposing its existing assets to extend their economic life and earning capacity on one hand, and on building a new energy and materials ecosystem on the other.
RIL’s clean energy business plan entails three parts– Rs 60,000 core investment in four giga factories that will manufacture and fully integrate all the critical components for the business, Rs 15,000 crore investment in building value chain, partnerships and future technologies, including upstream and downstream industries, and repurposing the company’s engineering, project management and construction capabilities towards clean energy.
The four giga factories would include an integrated solar photovoltaic module factory, an advanced energy storage battery factory, an electrolyser factory for green hydrogen, and a fuel cell factory for converting hydrogen into motive and stationary power.
