Redflow scores second major battery sale for remote Pacific Island projects

One Step Off The Grid

The zinc-bromine flow batteries of Australian energy storage company Redflow will again be used to help supply reliable, clean power to remote Pacific Island sites, after the Brisbane based company secured a second major international order.

Redflow said on Monday that Auckland-based Hitech Solutions had placed a $A750,000 order for a major, multiple stage project using Redflow’s ZBM2 batteries to build advanced hybrid energy storage systems across multiple sites in a Pacific Island nation.

The order is the second of its kind this year from Hitech, which specialises in providing telecommunications and infrastructure services in the Asia Pacific region.

Redflow says it has completed delivery of all of the batteries for the company’s first order, which was placed in May.

Redflow CEO Simon Hackett said the repeat sale to Hitech validated the appeal of the company’s 10-kilowatt hour (kWh) ZBM2 – billed as the world’s smallest zinc-bromine flow battery – as uniquely qualified to replace lead-acid batteries in remote site deployments, such as telecommunication sites.

“This second major sale confirms the unique advantages of our zinc-bromine flow batteries for this high-workload deployment in the tropics,” Hackett said in a statement.

“The ZBM2 excels in hot environments and for applications that require high cycle depth and cycle frequency, such as the deployment Hitech is undertaking.

“This sort of environment and use case wears out lead-acid batteries in relatively short order, requiring their frequent replacement, whereas ZBM2s thrive on heat and hard work.

“We look forward to working with Hitech to ensure its imminent deployments of remote energy systems are successful in a variety of site sizes.”

The ZBM2 battery also comes with a 10-year or 36,500 kWh warranty, giving it a much longer operating life than lead-acid batteries, which are typically replaced every 18-36 months when used in warm climates.

Hitech placed its order through Redflow partner Vertiv (formerly Emerson Network Power), a mature Redflow system integrator that has previously deployed ZBM2 batteries for telco-related energy storage systems in New Zealand and Australia.

This article was originally published on RenewEconomy’s sister site, One Step Off The Grid, which focuses on customer experience with distributed generation. To sign up to One Step’s free weekly newsletter, please click here.