In Search Of Solid State Battery Stocks
by Debra Fiakas, CFA
Greater energy density or the amount of energy stored is the mission of every battery developer. The higher the energy density, the longer a battery can serve its owner. Scientists have been adjusting circulating chemistry, cloaking electrodes in exotic metals, and otherwise tinkering with conventional battery designs. Debate even spills over into the raw material supply chain as it has recently over the use of expensive and sometimes difficult to source cobalt as an additive to lithium ion battery designs. Others are trying to tame silicon for use in battery anodes.
Perhaps the most daring developers have abandoned conventional battery design...
Energy Storage: Q3 2012 Winners and Losers
John Petersen I usually write a quarterly recap to summarize what happened in the energy storage and vehicle electrification sectors, but Q2 was a tough enough period that I don't see much sense in dwelling on the bloodletting. So instead of focusing on the past, I'll offer a quick summary table with lots of red ink and turn my attention to Q3, which is shaping up as a time of bright opportunity for some companies and profound risk for others. I expect three companies in my tracking group to perform very well in Q3 –...
Battery Investing For Beginners, Part 4
John Petersen In "The Sixth Revolution: The Coming of Cleantech," Merill Lynch strategist Steven Milunovich heralded cleantech as a new investment theme and forecast a period of gut wrenching change followed by an age of plenty. A few days later venture capital icon Vinod Khosla warned his audience “500 million people on earth enjoy a lifestyle that 9 billion people will want in 2050.” The differences between these two informed viewpoints are more than a little stark, but they highlight a frightening truth about cleantech: for the first time in human history the fundamental drivers of a technological...
Alternative Energy Technologies and the Origin of Specious
John Petersen Thanks to a recent comment from JLBR, I've found a new hero in Dr. Peter Z. Grossman, an economics professor from Butler University who cogently argues that government attempts to force alternative energy technologies into an R&D model that was created for the Manhattan Project and refined for the Space Program will always result in commercial disaster because "the goal of the Apollo Program was the demonstration of engineering prowess while any alternative energy technology must succeed in the marketplace." In a recent article titled "The Apollo Fallacy and its Effect on U.S. Energy Policy" Dr....
Vinod Khosla on the Future of Lithium-ion Batteries
John Petersen On Monday of this week, the treehugger blog published a guest essay from Vinod Khosla that clarified his stance on the future of next generation lithium-ion batteries. The essay was prompted by "blog chatter" about an article in Earth2Tech where he was quoted as saying that lithium-ion batteries are overhyped. Since the Khosla essay included a link to my article "Why Lead-Carbon Batteries Will Deflate the Li-ion Bubble," I think it's important to tell readers that Mr. Khosla has written his own essay on the subject and encourage them...
Lithium-ion Battery Stocks: Investment Opportunities or Subsidized Laggards?
John Petersen I'm often critical of public lithium-ion battery manufacturers based on objective investment metrics including their financial condition, their results of operations, their potential markets and the fundamental soundness of their business plans, but I don't usually drill down into thornier issues like technical merit and business execution because those questions are out of my depth and in the words of Harry Callahan, "A man's got to know his limitations." Every once in a while, however, organizations that are competent to evaluate those issues publish analytical reports that can help investors cut through the hype...
Electric Vehicles Will Increase China’s Air Pollution
John Petersen Last week the American Chemical Society published a white paper in Environmental Science & Technology from a team of researchers at Tsinghua University, Beijing, and the Argonne National Laboratory Center for Transportation Research titled "Environmental Implication of Electric Vehicles in China." This white paper concludes that: Implementing electric vehicles in China will increase national CO2, SO2 and NOX emissions; and Gasoline HEVs are more environmentally friendly, more commercially mature, and less cost-intensive. The following graph comes from page 4 of the white paper and compares the relative fleet wide CO2 emissions for gasoline ICEs,...
Common Sense in Energy Storage Investing
John Petersen In the wake of last fall's initial public offering by A123 Systems (AONE) I wrote a four part series on battery investing for beginners. Over the last six months, changes in the storage sector have been coming at a fast and furious pace and many of my recent blogs have focused on technical minutiae rather than the stock market. They've led to heated debate with die hard EV advocates who don't understand the difference between technical and economic reality and religious belief, but I'm not sure how useful they've been for investors who see the potential...
Two Stocks For Grid Storage – ZBB Energy and Axion Power
John Petersen On March 4, 2011 the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory published a comprehensive review of "Electrochemical Energy Storage Technologies for Green Grid" that is a must-read for serious investors who want to understand the technical and economic intricacies of the energy storage sector. It explains why storage is a key enabling technology for wind and solar power, the smart grid, efficient transportation and a legion of high-technology manufacturing and service enterprises that can't survive without reliable power. It also explains why energy storage is an investment mega-trend that will endure for decades. While I normally try to...
What I Sold: Electro Energy, Inc. (NASD:EEEI)
Of all the stocks I've sold in response to the market turmoil, Electro Energy was the most painful to sell, both emotionally and financially. The sale was painful emotionally because I've been recommending this company for a year (albeit with the caveat that it was a speculative bet.) In each article I wrote I said something along the lines of "If EEEI can obtain financing..." Now even investment grade companies have serious trouble obtaining financing. If an outside company is interested in EEEI's manufacturing assets or technology, there is little reason for them to buy EEEI stock. Any outside...
What I Sold: VRB Power (VRBPF.PK, VRB.V)
VRB Power is the only public vendor of a flow battery chemistry, the Vanadium Redox Battery. I bought the company when I first realized that in order to get a large proportion of intermittent wind and solar energy onto the grid, long term electricity storage would be essential. Of the available technologies, flow batteries are some of most technically elegant. Since VRB is one of only two publicly traded vendors of large scale batteries, I bought some. Lessons Learned I was not being discriminating. Even with the belief that large scale storage will soon be needed to integrate...
Lithium Technology Dominates Large Energy Storage Projects
by Debra Fiakas, CFA
Market share for lithium technology has been extended by another 22 megawatts with the selection of lithium-based batteries by Duke Energy (DUK: NYSE) for three separate of power facilities operated by Duke Energy Florida. Duke did not specify the source of the lithium-based batteries, but the company seems to have an affinity for Tesla’s (TSLA: Nasdaq) battery products. Last year Duke Energy with its partner University of South Florida chose Tesla’s lithium-based batteries for a 100-kilowatt solar project in St. Petersburg, Florida.
Application of lithium-based technology in a relatively small, microgrid application like that in St. Petersburg is no surprise. Lithium-based batteries offer high energy...
Lithium Technology Corporation (LTHU.PK)
Quite a while ago, I promised readers that I'd write an article looking into Lithium Technology Corporation (LTHU.PK,) in addition to articles I've already written on US Geothermal (HTM) and Evergreen Solar (ESLR) Lithium Tech is a provider of custom lithium rechargeable batteries for military, national security, stationary power, and transportation applications. Investors hoping for the big score probably have their eyes on the transportation applications, which should drive demand for lithium-ion batteries over the next decade. That's all wonderful, but since August, we've had a financial meltdown, prompting me to focus much more on companies' need to raise...
No Battery Producer Left Behind
by Debra Fiakas CFA In late 2009, nine companies in the battery sector were recipients of American Reconstruction and Recovery Act (ARRA) funds awarded by the Department of Energy to jump start manufacturing capacity. By the end of December 2011, six of them had made enough progress to begin production. Three were lagging behind, including Exide Technologies (XIDE: Nasdaq) and its partner Axion Power International (AXPW: OTC/BB). Exide's Sundancer Electric Car, October 1973. Exide and Axion are not looking so quick today. Photo by Frank Lodge, EPA. Public Domain ...
A123’s Planned IPO Moves to the Front Burner
John Petersen After six months of regulatory silence and $100 million in new funding, A123 Systems amended the SEC registration statement for its proposed IPO on June 23rd. While this latest filing may simply be A123's way demonstrating its ability to raise matching funds for a scaled back ATVM loan request of $1 billion and pending applications for $438 million in direct Federal grants, my sense is that the proposed IPO will probably come to market in early September. Since ATVM loans will require 20% cost sharing and direct Federal grants will require 50% cost...
EVs, Lithium-ion Batteries and Liars Poker
John Petersen Last week I stumbled across a link that led to a 2010 report from the National Research Council titled "Hidden Costs of Energy, Unpriced Consequences of Energy Production and Use." This free 506-page book takes a life-cycle approach – from fuel extraction to energy production, distribution, and use to disposal of waste products – and attempts to quantify the health, climate and other unpriced damages that arise from the use of various energy sources for electricity, transportation and heat. After studying the NRC's discussion of the unpriced health effects, other nonclimate damages and greenhouse gas...
