Troy Company Aids Development of UK Energy Storage Plants

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Troy-based chemical company LG Chem Power Inc. first began manufacturing lithium-ion batteries in 1998, and is one of the world’s largest lithium-ion battery manufacturers with a significant market share in consumer, automotive, and stationary applications. As energy companies around the world work towards increased energy savings, environmental responsibility, and sustainability, LG Chem Power has created a robust mass production system for their battery technology and now supplies cells to major international companies, becoming one of the world’s principal battery manufacturers across several industries.

The most recent company to utilize LG Chem’s lithium-ion battery is VLC Energy, a London-based company working to develop the United Kingdom’s largest energy storage plants, which are intended to be connected to their electricity network by the end of 2017. They will allow VLC Energy to store extra generated electricity during off-peak times, to be used later as a supplement when demand grows during high-peak times.

The battery projects will harness the LG Chem’s latest lithium-ion battery technology to provide a “vital balancing service” on a national scale, with “almost instantaneous responses of less than one second to surges in energy supply and demand,” according to a press release. The technology is expected to save the U.K. around $250 million U.S. dollars in savings across all of their contracts, by reducing wasted energy.

LG Chem Power’s lithium-ion battery provides several advantages, including improved abuse tolerance through a safety reinforced separator, mixed cathode chemistry, and safer packaging. It also offers better thermal performance due to its thin, flat packaging, higher reliability due to its simpler manufacturing, and lower total costs after streamlining packaging and chemistry.