Thermal and compressed air storage firm Cheesecake Energy Limited (CEL) has received investment from the University of Nottingham to support UK-wide pilot programmes of its energy storage solution.
The new funding is part of a continuing partnership between the University of Nottingham and the Nottingham-based start-up.
The company is designing a 150kW/750kWh prototype system for completion in Q4 of this year, which will be deployed with a local bus depot for charging of electric buses using renewable energy. The system is suited to applications in the 500kW to 50MW range.
The company says an installed system, which includes an average cost for shipping, EPC and balance of plant, is around $300/kWh based on a 1MW/4MWh system (excluding site-specific costs such as grid connection).
Although CEL would not disclose the sum of the Univeristy of Nottingham loan, it has secured £1.3million in non-dilutive funding from other sources this year to design and manufacture its modular demonstrator plant. This includes business support and funding from the Advanced Propulsion Centre (APC) and the UK’s Technology Developer Accelerator Programme (TDAP).
CEL’s system charges by using an electric motor to compress air, with the subsequent heat from this process stored separately at ambient pressure in a thermal store, alongside the high-pressure compressed air held in an air tank. It is discharged by running the process in reverse.
The technology can be charged using power from solar PV, wind or other renewables, or take power directly from the grid.