Company: Connected Energy
Founder: Matthew Lumsden
Website: https://www.connected-energy.co.uk
About Connected Energy
Connected Energy is a pioneer in the circular economy, solving two problems at once: finding a second life use for electric vehicle (EV) batteries, and creating reliable storage for renewable energy.
The company was established in 2013 to develop commercial battery energy storage using end of life batteries. They are one of only a handful of companies worldwide to have proven this technology.
Electric vehicle batteries have a useful life of approximately 10 years within a vehicle. After that time the batteries no longer provide sufficient range to be useful in vehicles, but they still retain 75-80% of their original capacity. Our technology was born out of a realisation of the significant environmental impact of mining the precious metals required to create lithium batteries and the subsequent challenge of their disposal. Our systems take advantage of their remaining capacity by repurposing them – making the environmental and economical case for electric batteries so much stronger.
A recent study by Lancaster University showed a 450tonnes C02 saving for each MWh of second life system installed – when compared with a system using new lithium ion batteries.
Renewable energy is inherently volatile and intermittent. Solar systems only operate during the day, and wind systems only when the wind is blowing. Our product solves this problem for utilities and others, improving grid flexibility, boosting the reliability of zero-carbon electricity and helping our customers meet their sustainability targets.
Over the last ten years, we’ve overcome a range of challenges. As a new concept, the team have developed standards, systems and technologies to create a commercial product.
The company’s proprietary technology is itself complex, requiring control systems that aggregates thousands of individual retired batteries sourced directly from battery OEMs and allowing their operation as one unit. We developed software to control the systems to allow their charge and discharge of energy to meet a variety of applications – from responding to energy demands on sites in real time and working with energy aggregators to provide grid balancing services.
Ensuring safety has also been a top priority. When our work began, there were no standards governing the performance and safety of second life battery use. Connected Energy has created the gold standard by embedding AI which can identify anomalies in the performance of individual batteries. Finally, we have also developed the necessary wrap-around services that our customers need such as warranties, insurance, maintenance and data services.
The company is at an exciting stage of its development – with the concept proven and systems operating commercially in the UK and Europe – we’re ready to scale-up. As more electric vehicles are reaching the end of their lives, the company is developing large scale development projects in line with battery availability timelines. In 2022, the company gained investment from a number of partners including Volvo Energy and CAT. Since then, the company has doubled in size, ready to develop new technologies to ensure that we are providing a second life to more batteries at scale, driving the circular economy for battery reuse.
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