/
My account person ENGIE

My notifications

News See all the news
The battery revolution in thermal energy storage
Viva Technology 16/05/2024

The battery revolution in thermal energy storage

From May 22 to 25, 2024, ENGIE will welcome the Hungarian manufacturer of intelligent thermal batteries, HeatVentors, to its stand at Viva Technology. CEO Jozsef Kakas answers our questions.

Our smart thermal battery can help optimize the operation of heating and cooling systems, reduce energy consumption and decarbonize processes.

We believe that energy storage, including thermal energy storage with PCM, has great benefits for companies like ENGIE, as well as for ENGIE customers.

Can you tell us a  few words about your company?

The company's founders, Rita Farkas and Zoltán Andrássy, PhD, are energy engineers who began researching heat accumulators and phase change materials in 2013. Several papers have been published based on their results, which were presented at several national and international conferences. Encouragement from industry experts led to the creation of HeatVentors Ltd. in 2017.

HeatVentors Ltd. currently has 14 employees with a sales and engineering team of 5 to 6 people. Jozsef Kakas, CEO and Head of Sales, joined the team in 2022. He has over 25 years of experience in sales, finance, product and risk management in different positions. The company has more than 50 smart thermal batteries installed in Hungary, France, Portugal and Italy. In 2023, we launched two projects in Oman and the United Arab Emirates and signed contracts with two distributors in these countries.

EIT Innoenergy, V3 Capital Partners and a private individual are the investors in the company.

What will you showcase at Vivatech?

We bring our demo model to show how our product can be easily integrated into a building's cooling and heating system. We will present how a smart battery can save energy for these systems.

Its use is wide, it can be integrated into any heat transfer fluid cooling and heating system and it is particularly recommended in buildings with higher energy consumption, such as hotels, data centers, commercial buildings, medical institutions. and office buildings. The solution supports the implementation of Co2 emissions reduction plans of individual industries and sectors, as well as the acquisition of ESG ratings.

It can also be used with high efficiency in technological processes such as wine cooling, cosmetics production, cooling of processing machines and ovens. It provides an excellent solution for the use of waste heat and a cheaper and more sustainable solution for electricity storage if the end use of the energy is in the form of thermal energy. The battery can be transported, providing the opportunity to bridge the differences between energy production and consumption not only in time but also in space.

How is your solution innovative?

Heatventors Ltd.'s Intelligent Thermal Battery works with phase change materials  (PCM) and can store energy at a temperature ranging from -30 and +120 Celsius degrees for a long time. (with 1-2% energy loss per day) The technology enables energy to be stored at a given temperature, thus ensuring a continuous and predictable energy supply. The solution, which includes the storage with the heat exchanger, the phase change material and the control system, is the result of more than 10 years of research.

Through the phase change, energy can be stored with a high energy density. (30kWh/1 m3) In terms of the entire mechanical solution, up to 90% space can be saved compared to water tanks. 

The PCM used in the systems is environmentally friendly, based on plant oil, with a lifetime of 10,000 + cycles with unchanged parameters. In the battery, an uniquely developed heat exchanger ensures fast and homogeneous phase change and thus energy storage. 

Energy savings are also ensured by a proprietary control system. It reduces consumption peaks, operates energy producers with optimal partial load, reducing maintenance costs. Its regulatory system also enables to be included in demand response processes.

Heatventors brings PCM based thermal energy storage technology in any building. We are developing a new market.

What do you expect from this participation in Viva Technology alongside ENGIE?

ENGIE is a company very open to innovations, looking for solutions adapted to the operation of its systems.  They have countless heating and cooling solutions all over the world . We believe that energy storage, including thermal energy storage with PCM, has great benefits for companies like ENGIE, as well as for ENGIE customers.

The intelligent thermal battery can help optimize the operation of heating and cooling systems, reduce energy consumption and decarbonize processes.

We appreciate that ENGIE supports Heatventors. We are already working in partnership on projects and believe the results will be satisfactory to all parties. Vivatech will help us to know ourselves better.

To which innovation throughout history would you most relate?

Defining innovation is always a big question. For me, it's about using existing knowledge and tools, loosely combined to create a new solution that's useful for someone.

I really like the invention of the wheel. This is somehow similar to our solution. The operation is simple and it is simple to use, it exists in nature (like fusion, or solidification). It has many operational, financial and environmental benefits. It can be used in many sectors and it can be combined with existing technologies.

What will be your next challenge?

The company targets different geographic markets: the Middle East, with its high demand for cooling and daily temperature fluctuations suitable for the use of thermal batteries; Central and Eastern Europe where we can help balance decarbonization efforts and the variability of the production of renewable energy sources and where proximity accelerates and facilitates the implementation of projects. 

A capital increase is planned to accelerate this expansion, strengthen technical support and also finance the development of larger storage modules (1.2 MWh).


Other news on related topics

Sign up for the ENGIE Innovation Newsletter

Loading...

By continuing to browse, you accept that ENGIE uses cookies for the purpose of saving information about your browsing on the Site. Cookies help make your browsing experience easier and also make it possible to gather statistics about who visits the Site with the goal of improving its quality. For more information, click here.
Consult cookies policy

close icon