Turning Conventional Battery Tech into Unconventional Profits
by Debra Fiakas CFA Near the end of February 2014, Highpower International (HPJ: Nasdaq) announced its first order for large-format lithium ion batteries to use in electric vehicles. Its customer, Huizhou Yipeng Energy Technology will be integrating the batteries into buses destined for the sales outlets of China-based manufacturers. The boost in sales for Highpower is likely to be meaningful. Management estimates each bus will use as many as 288 of the company’s 20-ampere-hour battery. Guidance for annual sales from Huizhou Yipeng alone is in a range of $4 million to $5 million. In the most...
Pure Play Energy Storage Stocks Year-End Review And Outlook
John Petersen With only a couple trading days left in 2009, this is as good a time as any for a performance review. The predictions I made at this time last year were pretty solid with an 80% accuracy rate on price direction. For the year, a $1,000 investment in each of my green star companies would have yielded a portfolio appreciation of 67%, which handily beat the broader market indices. That being said, my star and caution ratings were a good deal less prescient because I seriously underestimated the potential of both Maxwell Technologies (MXWL) and Active...
Canadian and Tanzanian Graphite Connections
A list of graphite companies covered in this series can be found here.
Like performance test results, customer relationships are critical stepping stones for graphite developers. In June 2018, Northern Graphite (NGC: TSX-V) announced a memorandum of understanding with a European trading company to sell 100% of the output from Northern’s Bisset Creek resources in Ontario, Canada. China-based manufacturers are the intended end-users. Northern management is using the arrangement as leverage with prospective investors to finance mine infrastructure and processing equipment. Capital costs are expected to exceed CA$145 million.
Northern claims a proprietary purification technology the company intends to use to upgrade its graphite output. Its Bissett Creek deposit...
Axion Power and BMW Report Impressive Performance Test Results
John Petersen After seven years of cautious disclosures about the development status, performance and market potential of its serially patented PbC® battery technology, Axion Power International (AXPW.OB), in conjunction with BMW (BAMXY.PK), has finally released impressive performance test results that show why the PbC battery is a superior choice for automotive stop-start applications. Concurrently, Axion released a white paper that discusses stop-start battery requirements in detail and offers some hints about the PbC battery's potential for use in other emerging energy storage markets. The presentation and the white paper do not show small, incremental gains like you...
USPS Study: EV Economics Depend On Smart-Grid Revenue
John Petersen On August 28th, the Office of the Inspector General of the U.S. Postal Service published the results of a feasibility study titled, "Electrification of Delivery Vehicles." While the feasibility study reaches a foregone conclusion and recommends the purchase of a 3,000 unit demonstration fleet, I was surprised by the high level of Federal subsidies the Inspector General thought necessary to bring EVs within Postal Service capital investment policies. I was even more surprised by the conclusion that the tipping point in the economic analysis was revenue from ancillary vehicle to grid, or V2G, services. The...
When Will Polypore Payoff?
by Debra Fiakas CFA Diagram of a battery with a polymer separator. Lithium ion batteries make it possible to recharge your smart phone, camera and a multitude of other have-to-have-with-us-every-moment devices. Yet the average person knows very little of the inner workings of something so important to our daily lives. One little item in a battery is a highly specialized membrane that fits neatly between opposing electrodes - the positive and negative poles that make an electrical charge. This membrane manages the charge and discharge process. ...
Valuation Primer For Energy Storage Companies – Lesson #2
John Petersen On November 6th I published Lesson #1 in this series, which provided a quick side-by-side comparison of Ener1 (HEV) and Exide Technologies (XIDE). Yesterday two more companies that I track, A123 Systems (AONE) and Enersys (ENS), reported results for the September quarter. The quick summary is that Enersys handily beat street estimates while the bleeding at A123 continued unabated. To follow up with the format I introduced last week, the first graph is a simple market performance comparison of the two companies over the last year. The second graph comes from my...
Altair Nanotechnologies Awarded $250,000 Grant for Advancement of Its Alternative Energy Program
Altair Nanomaterials (ALTI) announced that it has been awarded a $250,000 grant from the Indiana Advanced Energy Technologies Program (AETP) initiative. The grant funding must be used to manufacture products containing products that are not currently in the U.S. market, and that are above industry standard in terms of energy efficiency (e.g. hybrid automobiles, fuel cells) and/or incorporate an innovative technology, such as nanotechnology, that allows the product to save energy. The grant money will be used for test equipment for the manufacturing of lithium ion cells, batteries, and battery packs. The stock gapped open this...
Arotech Receives Additional Research Funding of $650,000 from U.S. Army
Arotech Corporation (ARTX) announced that its Battery and Power Systems division has received additional funding from the U.S. Army's Communications and Electronics Command, CECOM, for further development of its 4th generation (Gen4) zinc-air cells. The funding covers Phase II of a three-phased research and development program for Gen4 Zinc-Air Cells aimed at the Future Force Warrior project - the U.S. Army's flagship Science and Technology initiative to develop and demonstrate revolutionary capabilities for Future Force soldier systems. Arotech's Gen4 portable battery pack is 12 or 24 Volts and has a total capacity exceeding 400Wh with Battery Energy Density above...
Why Energy Storage Investors Must Understand Economies of Scale
John Petersen One of the most seductive and dangerous stock market myths is the immensely popular but demonstrably false notion that the rapid cost reductions and performance gains we enjoyed during the information and communications technology revolution will be repeated in the age of cleantech. The persistence of the mythology is astonishing when you consider that the entire history of alternative energy proves that cost reductions and performance gains are extraordinary events, rather than common occurrences. Investors who buy into economies of scale mythology without carefully considering the fundamental differences are in for a world of disillusionment and...
The Graphite Hustle
by Debra Fiakas CFA The Klondike Gold Rush of the 1800s has given way to the Canada Graphite Hustle of the 21st Century. In what may seem to many an interminable series on graphite resources developers we have made note of over a half dozen companies in Canada attempting to bring new supplies of graphite ore out of the earth. The action is not limited to Canada. There are at least a dozen other aspirants with plots in Canada and the rest of North America as well as in Australia and Africa. Piecing together disclosures by the...
Arotech Zinc-Air Battery Named One of the US Army’s ‘Great Inventions of the Year’
Arotech Corporation (ARTX) announced today that the BA-8180 Zinc Air battery developed by Arotech's Battery and Power Systems Division - has been designated as one of the "Greatest Army Inventions" of the past year. The ten winning teams will be recognized June 23 by the U.S. Army Research, Development and Engineering Command. Arotech is primarily a defense contractor. However, they are a lead contractor for the Military looking at Alternative Energy resources.
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...
Plug-in Vehicles Have Been Weighed in the Balance and Found Wanting
John Petersen A comment from maxkilmachina recently drew my attention to an article in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences titled Valuation of plug-in vehicle life-cycle air emissions and oil displacement benefits. While it costs $10 to download the article and supporting documentation, I believe it's worthwhile for all serious energy storage and electric vehicle investors because the underlying study is the first comprehensive total cost of ownership analysis I've seen that includes both direct end-user costs and identifiable externalities like emissions, military and other indirect costs arising from oil consumption in the US. While all...
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...
Why Energy Storage Investors Must Understand Resource Constraints
John Petersen This Saturday marks the second anniversary of my blog, which began with an article titled Lithium-ion Batteries and Centerfolds. Over time my archive has grown to 142 articles on energy storage devices, the companies that make them and their crucial role as enabling technologies for wind and solar power, transportation and the smart grid. While cleantech bloggers usually focus on new technologies that might be game-changers, I'd rather focus on major enhancements to proven technologies from established industry leaders. The reason is simple, hot new technologies have limited investment value if the world can't produce enough...
