蘑菇AV

They鈥檙e not light and they鈥檙e not small, but 鈥檚 batteries do have two particularly appealing qualities: they store energy cheaply and they have a long lifespan.

In short, they are an attractive option for large-scale renewable energy storage projects.

鈥淚f you鈥檙e a utility that wants to build a huge battery installation so that you can bring a lot of solar power to your grid and store solar electricity when it鈥檚 available and give up the energy at night, ours is going to be the most economical solution,鈥� says Ryan Brown (pictured below), Salient鈥檚 co-founder and chief executive officer.

That鈥檚 because Salient鈥檚 battery tech is built with zinc at its core. Zinc is a highly abundant material that鈥檚 known for being far easier to extract from the ground than the lithium used in most rechargeable batteries, meaning it鈥檚 cheaper for battery production.

With a unique technology, a business plan and early investors already lined up, the Kitchener-Waterloo company鈥檚 future looks bright.

Now, as the young firm plots its next steps, it鈥檒l be doing so from a new home base in Halifax.

鈥淏attery tech is a pretty unique field. It鈥檚 not like everywhere in the world has a good community of battery innovators, but Halifax does,鈥� says Brown.

One of those innovators is Chris Burns, president and CEO of 鈥� a company that specializes in high-precision testing and tweaking of new battery technologies. The company, which was spun out of Tesla collaborator Jeff Dahn鈥檚 lab at 蘑菇AV years ago, has amassed a global client base that includes the likes of Panasonic and Bosch. 聽聽聽 聽聽聽 聽聽聽 聽聽聽 聽聽聽 聽聽聽 聽聽聽 聽聽聽 聽聽聽 聽聽聽 聽聽

Reaching the next level

Salient co-founder Brian Adams, who now serves as the startup鈥檚 chief technology officer, met Burns years ago when he was working at a battery lab in Washington鈥檚 Pacific Northwest National Lab that bought a piece of Novonix gear.

The two reconnected in 2018 after Salient was accepted into the (CDL-Atlantic) program at 蘑菇AV. This time, with Brown and the growing Salient team in tow.

鈥淚t quickly became apparent that there were a lot of ways we could work together, especially as we move through our prototyping,鈥� says Brown.

Salient plans to work closely with Novonix as they work to fine-tune their battery chemistry for customer-ready prototype cells.

While Novonix tends to focus most of its business in working with companies testing and creating lithium-ion batteries (a higher-density chemistry used in smaller electronics) and applications, Burns says its technology works just as well with Salient鈥檚 alternative zinc-based chemistry.

鈥淲e can use all our equipment here to help them prototype their cells and take them to the next level and they don鈥檛 have to spend millions of dollars to buy all the equipment to do it themselves,鈥� he says.

Burns (pictured below), who started Novonix with a fellow researcher in 2013, says Halifax鈥檚 status as a hub of battery innovation stems in large part from research going on at 蘑菇AV. In addition to his former advisor Jeff Dahn鈥檚 research group, he cites work being done by Mark Obrovac鈥檚 group in the Department of Chemistry and in the Faculty of Engineering as indicators of university鈥檚 leadership in the field.

Novonix is now a co-sponsor (along with NSERC) of Obrovac's Industrial Research Chair in metal-ion batteries at Dal. This connection brings a number of opportunities for young people entering into the sector, including the ability to take battery materials invented in Obrovac's lab and fabricate them into full-sized batteries in Novonix鈥檚 facility just minutes away the university. A Mitacs internship facilitated through the lab also offers students that chance to spend half their time at Dal and the other half gaining valuable industrial experience at Novonix.

鈥淭he work around those groups is really what鈥檚 going to enable more activity to take place here,鈥� he says, noting the university鈥檚 first-class facilities.

The whole package

Burns was also part of the team that helped set up a Tesla R&D facility in Halifax in 2015, which is still up and running today. And he says the provincial government has now taken an interest in promoting the sector and attracting more battery companies to Halifax.

鈥淲e鈥檙e starting to build a little bit of a cluster here. Once we can build a little momentum around this, it鈥檚 about to become really attractive for other companies to look at the opportunity of being here,鈥� he says.

It was through CDL-Atlantic that Salient got a taste of all the city has to offer.

鈥淲e got to meet a lot of really great mentors and advisors, including ones that work in the energy space, and our investors are mainly based out of Halifax. We also got to meet with many professors at Dal who are really supportive of our work and are really keen to collaborate,鈥� says Brown.

鈥淚t鈥檚 really the whole package.鈥�