PES talks to Matt Maroon, VP of Product Management, Aquion Energy about salt water batteries and the importance of clean, green energy. Interest in storage is on the up….
PES: Welcome to PES Solar/PV magazine. Thanks for talking with us. Would you like to begin by explaining a little about the background of your organisation and how you currently serve the solar and wind industry?
Matt Maroon: Aquion Energy manufactures saltwater batteries that are high-performance, sustainable and cost-effective and provide daily deep cycling for multi-hour applications. Our founder, Jay Whitacre, began researching low-cost electrochemical approaches to bulk energy storage in 2007 and produced the first functioning Aqueous Hybrid Ion (AHI) battery the following year. By 2009, the technology was developed enough to begin production. As Aquion batteries are suitable for an array of users, we have deployments across the world including small-scale systems, such as homes and small businesses and large-scale commercial, industrial and OEM applications. Most of our installed systems to date are coupled with solar arrays.
PES: You are active in a number of industry sectors. How important is the residential market to you?
MM: The residential sector is one of our primary markets. We have over 50 partners worldwide who install residential energy storage systems for end customers. We see our batteries going into both off-grid and grid-tied systems. Coupling solar with storage enables customers to increase their self-consumption of solar and reduce reliance on diesel generators.
