TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – US project developer American Vanadium on Wednesday announced that it had entered into a master agreement that would allow it to market and sell German energy solutions provider Gildemeister’s CellCube vanadium redox flow batteries in North America.

The CellCube is a commercially proven energy storage system capable of scaling to multihour and multimegawatt sizes.

American Vanadium said that while it would immediately start sales efforts using commercially available vanadium electrolyte, the goal was to eventually integrate its own electrolyte supply from its flagship Gibellini mine, in Nevada, which was currently in the permitting phase.

"This [agreement] confirms the achievement of our goal of vertically integrating into an energy storage company that controls America's only domestic supply of vanadium, the critical element in the vanadium redox flow batteries,” American Vanadium CEO Bill Radvak said.

He added that reliable and economic energy storage technologies had been cited as the “Holy Grail” of the energy industry and, as a result of this agreement, the company would be able to immediately offer a market-ready energy storage solution to wind and solar generators, emergency and remote power applications, as well as for grid reliability and efficiency optimisation for commercial, industrial and military applications.

"With Gildemeister as a leader in the commercial production of vanadium redox flow batteries and American Vanadium having the only commercially viable source of high-quality vanadium in North America, there are tremendous advantages to the development of the North American market for our CellCube energy storage system," Gildemeister subsidiary Cellstrom MD Lars Mollenhoff pointed out.

"Given that the CellCube battery will last 20 years and that our high-purity vanadium electrolyte doesn't degrade and is fully recoverable, we have a significant performance and cost advantage over other large-scale energy storage systems.

“In addition to these advantages, we are developing innovative financial approaches to facilitate the sale of the CellCubes in America, including leasing the batteries entirely,” American Vanadium executive chairperson Ron MacDonald said.

The company’s TSX-V-listed shares rose by 9.21% on Wednesday morning to trade at C$0.83 apiece.