Zinc Batteries for California Electrical Customer Power Backup
Zelos Energy LTD
Recipient
San Leandro, CA
Recipient Location
9th
Senate District
20th
Assembly District
$1,412,830
Amount Spent
Active
Project Status
Project Update
As of March 2025, Zēlos Energy (formerly Anzode) completed the project, having met all project goals. The Zēlos team successfully developed battery prototypes, achieving a performance of 70 Wh/Kg and 191 Wh/L over 500+ charge-discharge cycles. Prototype cells attained 78 to 82 percent energy efficiency and passed UN 38.3 performance testing for the T1 and T4 benchmarks (altitude and shock testing). Independent third-party analysis found the Zēlos carbon payback time - a measure of time required for emissions savings from the product’s use to offset the greenhouse gases of its production – to be six times shorter than comparative Li-ion battery technology and six to nine times shorter than lead acid batteries.
View Final ReportThe Issue
California needs procurable energy options to fully enable solar and wind power as part of the state's goal of 100 percent renewable energy by 2045 (SB 100), and for renewable backup power. Li-ion battery technology continues to work to address safety concerns related to thermal runaway. Consumer gas generators use about 18 gallons of fuel per day. If 100,000 such generators are in use, 18,000 tons of carbon dioxide would be emitted in a 24-hour period. Gas generators also caused about 100 deaths in California from 2005 to 2017 due to carbon monoxide poisoning.
Project Innovation
The purpose of this agreement is to fund prototyping efforts of a novel rechargeable alkaline battery technology enabling reliable and safe energy storage solutions for different applications, including storage for renewable energy generation, long-term backup power, and micro-grid applications. This technology will bring long-life rechargeability to the alkaline battery chemistry and is environmentally benign, low-cost, and safe. The battery is built using water-based, non-flammable electrolytes and non-toxic earth-abundant electrode materials such as zinc (Zn) and manganese dioxide (MnO2). All materials are highly energy-dense, non-toxic, safe, and low-cost, and can be recycled into agricultural fertilizer at the end of life.
Project Goals
Project Benefits
Zēlos conducted prototyping and scale-up work, safety testing, and market and environmental research for zinc manganese technology. The project addressed the development of reliable, safe, and low-cost power backup solutions for Californians. Zēlos technology is 55 to 65 percent less expensive than lithium-ion and gas generators. The project generated technical, safety, and market insights to inform the potential role of zinc manganese batteries in California.
Reliability
This project will deliver ratepayer benefits, including providing backup power to improve electricity reliability in our state, especially for the 2.7 million Californians in fire-safety and electrical-outage risk areas and for the 9 million in disadvantaged communities.
Safety
Zēlos technology uses tilizes leverages abundant materials (Zn and Mn) with lower safety and supply chain risks than those required for lithium-ion batteries, and the batteries can last 10 years or longer for applications such as power backup.
Key Project Members
Sasha Gorer
Subrecipients
The Regents of California, San Diego
Strategen
The University of Newcastle
Lithiumion Expert Services LLC
Voltaiq
Boundless Impact Research & Analytics
Match Partners
Strategen
Zelos Energy LTD
The University of Newcastle
Lithiumion Expert Services LLC
UC San Diego- Center for Energy Research
Boundless Impact Research &
Analytics
