China and Japan duel over 'liquid' batteries for green energy

Rongke eyes lead in redox flow tech as Sumitomo Electric bets on mini units

20220810N storage battery

Battery storage units from Dalian Rongke Power sit at an energy project in the Chinese city of Dalian. (Photo courtesy of Dalian Rongke Power)

SHIN WATANABE and SHIMPEI NAKAMURA, Nikkei staff writers

DALIAN, China/OSAKA -- China's Dalian Rongke Power is competing with Japan's Sumitomo Electric Industries in capturing demand for a unique type of storage battery that will be crucial to expanding the use of renewable energy.

A power project in the city of Dalian began operations recently using a redox flow battery storage system developed by Rongke. The system offers a capacity of 400 megawatt-hours to contain power produced by wind turbines and other sources. Investment in the project totaled 1.9 billion yuan ($281 million).

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