Enercap Holdings and Apex Investments join forces to build world’s largest energy storage supercap – News

The joint venture aims to meet the rapidly growing demand for energy storage, driven by renewable energy development, grid balancing and electric vehicle production

Dubai-based supercapacitor energy producer Enercap Holdings and Abu Dhabi-based Apex Investments PSC, a leading diversified investment holding company, have formed a joint venture to build a 16 GWh/year production facility for supercapacitor energy storage. This cutting-edge technology surpasses the capabilities of the widely used lithium-ion technology. The joint venture aims to meet the rapidly growing demand for energy storage, driven by the growth of renewable energy, grid balancing, electric vehicle production, and optimizing power management and backup systems for industries such as data centers. Once operational, the facility will be the world’s largest supercapacitor energy storage factory and one of the largest energy storage or battery production factories in the world.

As part of this collaboration, Enercap Energy Holding Limited, the joint venture company, will establish a fully automated 10 GWh/year manufacturing facility in the Mussafah Industrial Zone in Abu Dhabi. In addition, Enercap Energy Holding Limited has agreed to acquire an existing manufacturing facility in Dubai Industrial City (DIC), which will be upgraded to a capacity of 6 GWh/year. Enercap currently has a global demand for over 30 GWh of large-scale energy storage systems (BESS). Apex Energy Holding Limited will hold 65 percent and Enercap SPV Limited 35 percent of the share capital in the joint venture company.

Energy storage is a critical part of the energy transition, with electrification and decarbonization requiring performance that increasingly goes beyond the scope of chemical batteries. Supercap energy storage, developed by Enercap in the UAE, meets these demanding requirements – long life, no capacity degradation, safety, environmental sustainability and recyclability, and abundant raw material availability. Enercap’s non-degradability allows it to deliver consistent and predictable capacity over its 25-year life cycle, essential for the bankability that the market values ​​when making energy storage investments.

Apex CEO Mark Blackwell said: “Stable, predictable and long-lasting energy storage performance is key to scaling renewable energy deployment and replacing fossil fuel-based power generation. Conventional batteries lack the reliability and longevity needed to attract the investment required to make significant advances in renewable energy storage and the transition to electrification.” He added: “Supercap energy storage, developed by Enercap in the UAE, offers the technological leap needed to accelerate the deployment of renewables, electric transport and decarbonisation at a critical time. The benefits of supercap storage are driving demand and we are delighted to support Waseem Qureshi and his team in their mission to scale capacity, enabling decarbonisation, electrification and the transition to supercap energy storage.”

Enercap technology has demonstrated significantly higher efficiency compared to lithium-ion batteries. It has 2.5 times the energy density and 5 times the power density of lithium-ion batteries. It also has an exceptionally high cycle life of up to 500,000 cycles, compared to only 5,000 cycles for lithium-ion batteries. Enercap technology operates safely over a wide temperature range from -30°C to +70°C, without the risk of thermal runaway because it eliminates chemical reactions. It also offers 99 percent round-trip efficiency, significantly exceeding the 85 percent efficiency of lithium-ion batteries. In addition, Enercap manufacturing facilities are 5 to 10 times more capital efficient than best-in-class lithium-ion battery manufacturing facilities.

Waseem Ashraf Qureshi, CEO of Enercap Holdings and inventor of the technology, expressed his enthusiasm for the partnership, saying, “We are excited about this joint venture with Apex, which will accelerate our global growth and expand our product portfolio to provide solutions across all energy storage applications. We believe this is the future of energy storage. From AA batteries to cell phone storage, EV charging stations and utility-scale storage, we have spent the last five years developing the most advanced energy storage solutions in the world – and now the market is poised to take off.”

Supercap energy storage provides high-performance solutions that are durable, non-degradable, fast-charging, safe, fully recyclable and cost-effective. Blackwell further emphasized that Enercap’s “patented, breakthrough technology will play a key role in accelerating global decarbonization efforts, serving the energy storage, electric vehicle and consumer markets.”

The UAE’s unparalleled human capital and infrastructure provide a solid foundation for the continued development of innovative technologies and products. With a strong focus on renewable energy and efficiency, the country offers an ideal environment for innovators and inventors to create solutions to the world’s complex energy challenges, rivaling global innovation hubs in the US, Europe and Asia.