“There's a way to do it better - Find it.”

Thomas A. Edison

At the turn of the 20th Century, Thomas Edison patented a nickel-iron battery which had an undesirable quirk of producing hydrogen. A century later Prof. Dr. Fokko Mulder and his research group at Delft University of Technology saw the combined use of battery and electrolyser as an advantage for the new age of renewable power, and invented a super-efficient integrated battery and electrolyser - the Battolyser®.

Battolyser® can store and supply electricity as a battery. When fully charged it automatically starts splitting water into hydrogen and oxygen, acting as an electrolyser with an outstanding efficiency. Battolyser® is extremely flexible and robust and can arbitrage between power and hydrogen production. For example, the battery function can monetize daily power imbalances whilst the produced hydrogen can monetize seasonal power imbalances and provide feedstock to industries that cannot be electrified.

The technology is based on nickel-iron electrodes which have been available since Edison’s times. They are combined with alkaline electrolysis technologies that are commercially available today, with a proven track record of 20-30 years lifetime. The novel and ground-breaking integration of these technologies remarkably improves performance, lowers cost and increases uptime.

Product features

Below are some features of a Battolyser® that make it valuable for many use cases:

  • Continuous operation and ability to swap between electricity and hydrogen production: a fully flexible system

  • Able to fully follow renewable power production, resulting in no curtailment and 100% green hydrogen eligible for clean fuel credits

  • Reduced power cost, due to high efficiency

  • Deployable at scale, due to abundant and conflict free active materials (nickel and iron)

  • The combination of an integrated battery & electrolyser in one system is cheaper than two separate systems

  • Long life time without stack replacements, as a result of a durable combination of the alkaline electrolysis and nickel-iron battery technology

  • Lower effective battery cost, as nickel-iron battery has a high depth of discharge without electrode degradation and is cannot be damaged from overcharging

  • Reduced downstream hydrogen compression need, due to elevated operational pressure

  • Non-flammable, due to water based electrolyte (unlike e.g. lithium ion batteries or sodium sulphur batteries)

  • Simple and cheap recycling at end of life, as no hazardous materials are used (unlike with PEM electrolysers or lithium ion batteries)

R&D facilities

We are continuously improving our facilities to support our product development and product innovation activities. Our current capabilities include:

  • Electrochemical characterisation lab: 100+ testing channels ranging between 10 A and 200 A (some with impedance capabilities)

  • The Battolyser Research Facility: a large testing facility to test stacks of commercial product size up to 15 kW

  • Workshop for constructing, building up, maintaining and adjusting test setups

  • Dedicated quality control room for analysis of externally manufactured parts

Future capabilities planned:

  • Materials characterisation facility (Scanning Electron Microscopy, X-Ray diffraction, elemental analysis, differential scanning calometry)

  • High pressure testing for increased product screening capabilities

  • Materials testing: tensile testing, materials ageing, surface roughness

  • Rapid prototyping facility (3D printing and materials cutting)

  • Powder handling laboratory: dedicated space to work with hazardous powders equipped to weigh, mix, coat, dry and sinter electrode active mass

  • General laboratory: equipped to perform standard tasks including weighing, mixing and component testing

Publications

Battolyser Systems holds the global patent portfolio to commercialize Battolyser® technologies and continuous further research with Delft University of Technology.

  • A Iranzoa, FM Mulder, Nickel-iron layered double hydroxides for an improved Ni/Fe hybrid battery-electrolyser, 10.1039/D1MA00024A.

  • FM Mulder, BMH Weninger, J Middelkoop, FGB Ooms, H Schreuders, Efficient electricity storage with a Battolyser®, an integrated Ni–Fe battery and electrolyser, Energy & Environmental Science, 10 (2017) 756-764.   

  • BMH Weninger, FM Mulder, Renewable Hydrogen and Electricity Dispatch with Multiple Ni– Fe Electrode Storage, ACS Energy Letters, 4 (2019) 567-571.

  • Barton et al., Characterisation of a nickel-iron Battolyser®, an integrated battery and electrolyser, Frontiers in Energy Research 8 (2020) 509052.

  • International Energy Agency publication: ‘Renewable Energy for Industry’, C. Philibert, IEA

  • EU Integrated SET-Plan on batteries