Portfolio news 0

As part of our World IP Day blog series, we look at the role intellectual property plays in innovation.

by Tim von Werne, CEO RFC Power

RFC Power’s mission is to develop the world’s lowest cost flow battery. Redox flow batteries are a form of rechargeable battery ideally suited for long duration, stationary energy storage applications. This class of batteries has a long life-cycle, high power density, and high efficiency; however, their widespread adoption has been hampered by their high up-front cost resulting from the use of vanadium. 

At RFC Power (RFC), we are developing a solution which retains all the positives of existing flow batteries while offering significant cost advantages, not just over vanadium flow batteries, but also over lithium ion batteries for long duration storage applications.

What is the IP?

Our technology is underpinned by eight years of work by Professors Nigel Brandon, Dean of Engineering and Anthony Kucernak, Professor of Physical Chemistry and their teams at Imperial College London. The core innovation is a hydrogen-manganese chemistry system which combines optimised cell architecture with low-cost chemistry, protected by a series of international patents. The patents were filed by the university’s technology transfer provider and licensed exclusively to RFC Power. In addition, we have also developed significant confidential know-how on the operation of our systems, which is treated as a Trade Secret.

Using RFC’s patents

RFC Power was founded in 2017 and is still at an early stage. Nevertheless, our patents have already been quite useful in defending our technology against potential competitors. A US-based team filed a US patent application which clearly overlapped one of our earlier filings. Our patent had already been granted in the US and we were able to have most of their claims rejected. This IP protection allowed us to prevent a well-funded US competitor from beating us to the market.

The role of flow battery storage and the energy transition 

The role of energy storage is vital as the use of variable renewables such as wind and solar grows.
 In a 100% renewable energy system, long duration energy storage is needed to smooth the peaks and troughs in energy supply and demand. Low-cost flow batteries can charge using variable renewables and convert that to a reliable, despatchable power supply which can be called upon to meet demand requirements. 
This type of energy storage will make a significant contribution to enabling the transition to a low-carbon or no-carbon energy system and RFC Power can play a significant role. In the coming years, we aim  to attract collaborators, customers, and investors, who will be looking to our development work, including our patent portfolio, when deciding on whether to work with us and help bring our technology to the world.