Innovation | Enzinc

Advanced Battery Developer Enzinc Wins Global Automotive and Mobility Innovation Challenge

by Enzinc Marketing | Apr 27, 2022 | Press Release

Advanced technology repurposes existing lead acid manufacturing infrastructure to expedite the deployment of better batteries

RICHMOND, Calif.: Enzinc Inc., an advanced rechargeable zinc battery developer, was selected for a competitive $1.8 million California Energy Commission (CEC) BRIDGE award to further develop its zinc batteries for stationary and mobility uses. After approval, the proceeds, along with $1.0 million of matching funds, will be used to design and test a long duration stationary battery and build out a pilot anode manufacturing line.

“If we are to electrify everything, we need batteries that use easily-sourced materials and can be scaled rapidly. Being selected for BRIDGE shows the rising awareness that we can’t place all of our energy storage bets on lithium technologies,” said Michael Burz, founder and CEO of Enzinc. “Today’s $60 billion lead-acid battery market can play a larger role in the energy transition by converting existing factories to use Enzinc’s drop-in technology and make more powerful, higher margin and longer lasting batteries.”

Batteries with Enzinc’s zinc microsponge anode’s safe, non-flammable materials will make it ideal for stationary energy storage inside homes and commercial buildings and adjacent to critical energy infrastructure. Additionally, it will be ideal for mobility including e-bikes, e-scooters, electric delivery vehicles and other electric vehicles with moderate ranges, as well as be able to replace the lead acid battery that all vehicles use for starter motors and other systems.

“The EPIC programs available at each stage of a clean energy company’s development and commercialization are creating a vibrant and innovative industry in California,” Burz said. “We are honored to have been a recipient of these vital awards at key points in our company’s growth and to be selected for BRIDGE.”

The Bringing Rapid Innovation Development to Green Energy, or BRIDGE, awards are funded by the Electric Program Investment Charge (EPIC) program, which will grant up to a total of $57.3 million over four rounds. Enzinc and four other companies were selected for the proposed final round of funding, contingent on final approval at a CEC business meeting.

Previously, Enzinc has received CalSEED Phase I and II awards, together worth $600,000, and a $292,000 CalTestBed voucher for product testing. The selection follows Enzinc’s announcements that it has formed an Industry Advisory Group with global leaders in battery production, use and recycling, and that it won the Global Automotive and Mobility Innovation Challenge, GAMIC, at the SAE International World Congress Experience.

Leading Clean Energy Companies Team with Advanced Energy Storage Innovator Enzinc

by Enzinc Marketing | Jan 17, 2022 | Press Release

Enzinc names key teaming partners for advanced zinc battery testing through the CalTestBed program

RICHMOND, Calif.: Enzinc Inc., an advanced battery technology developer bringing rechargeable zinc batteries to market, announced today that it has teaming agreements in place with leading energy companies for its third-party product testing. The testing is being done at University of California Riverside’s facilities through a CalTestBed award valued at $292,000.

The teaming partners include power backup provider to the global telecom industry BASE Technologies, EV charging SaaS company ChargeNet Stations, as well as a global battery manufacturer, a leading electric bike brand, and an international waste and recycling provider, which are teaming with Enzinc confidentially.

“It’s a vote of confidence in this technology’s potential that a number of companies are teaming with Enzinc during its testing phase,” said Danny Kennedy, chief energy officer of New Energy Nexus. “We’re thrilled that our programs are giving startups like Enzinc a leg up to innovate the way batteries are manufactured and deployed. We need to see more of this if we’re to accelerate the clean energy transition and electrify our economy.”

“Our teaming partners will ensure that our battery’s testing protocols reflect many of the use cases expected for advanced batteries with ‘Enzinc Inside’,” said Michael Burz, Enzinc founder and CEO. “The CalTestBed award will enable us to test how batteries with our exclusive zinc microsponge anode perform in key applications including e-bikes and other electric mobility, stationary power back up, and grid-tied and microgrid energy storage.”

Enzinc has been awarded a voucher near the maximum $300,000 value, which enables Enzinc to work with the expert team at U.C. Riverside’s battery testing facility. The third-party testing program both ensures Enzinc’s advanced battery design will be shaped by real world needs and demonstrates each partner’s commitment to innovation.

Rebecca Wolkoff, CTO at ChargeNet, looks forward to testing their software with the Enzinc hardware, “We are both committed to creating safe, affordable and sustainable energy storage. We appreciate that our ChargeNet team can provide guidance and feedback on the application of Enzinc’s technology.”

The competitive CalTestBed initiative is funded through California Energy Commission’s Electric Program Investment Charge (EPIC) program to speed the commercialization of clean energy technologies. It funds third-party testing at world-class facilities at nine University of California campuses and one national laboratory. The program is led by New Energy Nexus in partnership with the University of California Office of the President (UCOP) and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

Enzinc’s zinc micro sponge anode will power a family of high-performance rechargeable batteries. The anode’s structure allows the battery to provide more than three times the energy and have three times the lifespan of lead acid batteries while costing about the same, and it operates through a wider temperature range than lithium-based batteries. The battery is totally recyclable, much safer to use than either lead- or lithium-based batteries and uses zinc, a common material with no supply chain constraints.

This comes after the recent announcement that former president of Robert Bosch GmbH’s Powertrain Solutions Division and chief of its Progressive Mobility Players team, Stefan Seiberth, joined Enzinc’s senior advisory team.

Enzinc: ‘Zinc batteries go where lithium-ion cannot’

by Journalist | Sep 17, 2021 | Media Clip

By Robert Malthouse, Energy Storage Report

Could zinc batteries usurp lithium-ion’s strong market position and become the storage technology of choice?

The potential certainly exists and Enzinc CEO Michael Burz is on a mission to make it happen.

Headquartered at the University of California in Berkeley’s Richmond Field Station in the San Francisco Bay area, Enzinc’s engineering team has developed a sponge-type anode technology made from zinc, and says it will be the first company offering a rechargeable zinc-based battery that can compete with lithium-ion.

Who’s backing Enzinc?

Enzinc created the anode using technology developed by the US Naval Research Laboratory. So far, Enzinc has raised north of $1.3m, mainly in the form of grants from the US Department of Energy and the California Energy Commission, as well as investments made by founders, senior advisors and angel investors.

The company recently completed 1,000 cycles of its test anode and is beginning to scale the technology into a small battery for commercial testing, which is scheduled to take place in the second quarter of next year

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Battery Week: Competitors to Lithium-ion Batteries in the Grid Storage Market

by Journalist | May 14, 2021 | Media Clip

By David Roberts, Canary Media/Volts

Lithium-ion batteries probably have cars locked up, but what about grid storage?

Welcome back to Battery Week — where we use the term “week” somewhat loosely.

Up until now, we’ve been focusing on lithium-on batteries (LIBs) — why they are so important, how they work, and the varieties of LIBs that are battling it out for the biggest battery market, electric vehicles (EVs).

It’s fairly clear from that discussion that LIBs, in some incarnation, are going to dominate EVs for a long while to come. There is no other commercial battery that can pack as much power into as small a space and lightweight a package. Plus, LIBs have built up a large manufacturing base, driving down prices with scale and industry experience. Their lock on the EV market is likely unbreakable, at least for the foreseeable future.

But there’s another battery market where some competitors hope to get a foothold: grid storage. They think there’s space in that market waiting to be claimed.

Zinc batteries

Several companies are working on batteries that exchange zinc ions instead of lithium ions — it’s the second-most-popular metal for batteries.

Zinc has the particular advantage of being light and energy-dense like lithium, so with relatively modest adjustments, it can slipstream into the lithium-ion manufacturing process.

Zinc is plentiful, cheaper than lithium, largely benign, and makes batteries that are easier to recycle. Like other lithium alternatives, zinc sacrifices energy density, but makes some of it back up in savings on safety systems at the battery-pack level, thanks to the lack of any need for fire suppression. This puts it in the same markets as lithium iron phosphate (LFP): smaller commuter/city vehicles, robo-taxis, scooters, e-bikes — and energy storage.

Some in the zinc crew have more ambitious designs: “We think we can coexist with lithium-ion and replace lead acid,” says Michael Burz, president and CEO of EnZinc, which has developed a new zinc anode it says can come close to LIBs on energy density. Remember, lead-acid batteries are still ubiquitous. “Forklifts use them. Airplanes. Snowmobiles,” says Burz. “Data centers have huge banks of lead-acid batteries they use for switchover power.” The technology still has a $45 billion global market.

EnZinc thinks it can hit a sweet spot: close to the energy density of LIBs, close to the low cost of lead-acid, safer than either, and good enough to substitute for a big chunk of both.

Zinc anodes are “cathode-agnostic,” so Burz envisions his company becoming an anode supplier, rather than a battery manufacturer, with “Zinc Inside” labels modeled on the “Intel Inside” processor designation. Research is underway on a number of cathodes, from manganese and nickel to — just as with lithium — air. A zinc-air battery “has a system-level specific energy of anywhere between 250 to 350 watt-hours per kilogram,” says Burz, a level well above most LIBs. The trick is making it controllable and rechargeable. There are zinc-air battery companies offering commercial products that claim they’ve solved those problems, such as NantEnergy (formerly Fluidic), which is targeting its zinc-air batteries at off-grid markets in developing countries.

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Zinc Battery Developer Enzinc Wins CalSEED Phase II Clean Energy Startup Award

by Enzinc Marketing | Feb 12, 2021 | Press Release

Company wins $450,000 grant, announces prototype surpassed 500 cycles

RICHMOND, Calif.: EnZinc, a clean battery technology developer, and the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory have been published in the prestigious Science magazine on their work to develop a unique three-dimensional (3D) zinc electrode. The research aims to bring a safer, more affordable rechargeable battery to market for electric vehicles, ebikes, and home and grid energy storage.

“This breakthrough in rechargeable battery technology means that zinc has the potential to displace lithium because it is a safer, more affordable, and more readily available material,” said President and CEO of EnZinc, Michael Burz. “Large battery-powered electronics from electric vehicles to home energy storage will be able to be powered by cleaner, fully recyclable zinc-based batteries—and they’ll carry none of the fire risk of lithium-based batteries.”

The report is the culmination of six years of development on a unique 3D zinc sponge structure that for the first time allows zinc, the fourth most mined metal on the planet, to be used as an anode in a rechargeable high-performance battery. The 3D zinc material is inherently safe and totally recyclable, offering a number of advantages over lead acid and lithium ion batteries.

Researchers have tried to make a rechargeable zinc anode since Edison first patented it in the 1900s. However, dendrites—stalactite-like growths that short out a zinc battery when it was recharged—shortened the cycle life of zinc, limiting it to disposable batteries or complex fuel cells. This structure of this new 3D zinc anode eliminates the issue, resulting in a battery that will offer performance comparable to Li-ion batteries with a price more like lead-acid batteries. This new anode can be coupled with various cathode materials to produce a family of batteries for multiple applications ranging from electric vehicles to grid energy storage.

Their work was partially funded from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy (ARPA-E) Robust Affordable Next Generation Energy Storage Program, the remaining funding from the Office of Naval Research and private funding.

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