Standards Development

Scope

This international standard is a guidance for the electrolyte for vanadium flow batteries and is applicable only for vanadium flow batteries. It does not include any general aspects, safety or testing methods like in IEC 62932-1:2020, IEC 62932-2 and IEC 62932-2-2:2020.

Purpose

Due to the accelerated expansion of renewable energies worldwide, the demand for stationary
electrochemical energy storage systems is increasing. One of the most important technologies is flow
batteries, which have seen an accelerated expansion of systems with an energy content of up to more than 400 MWh, especially in the last three years. In addition to the zinc/bromine, iron/chromium and iron/iron technologies, flow batteries based solely on vanadium as the active material are the most important representatives of flow batteries with commer cialisation efforts on almost all continents. Today, the vanadium flow battery (VFB) is the most important representative with the largest number of commercial and demonstration installations. Today, there are companies around the world that sell VFBs or are in the process of commercialising them. This applies to all energy and power ranges, from home storage to community storage, larger industrial plants and large -scale plants of over 100 MW in the grid. Companies are now spread all over the world and are mainly located in China, Germany, Denmark, Austria, Japan, USA, Canada, Spain, Italy, Australia, India, Korea, South Africa and other countries.

Due to the rapidly increasing demand for vanadium flow batteries and thus the increasing demand for vanadium electrolyte, a large number of new electrolyte production plants are currently under construction and in planning in China, Korea, Australia, Europe, South Africa, Canada and the USA. In addition, there are numerous explorations for new vanadium resources and increased mining activities.

A basic condition for the successful technical functions of VFBs are electrolytes, i.e. the active material solutions with specific compositions of ingredients. Standardised electrolytes lead to a standardisation of production results, higher availability and better quality, as well as increased trust in electrolyte producers and battery manufacturers and thus in reduced costs and higher reliability of the battery system and the energy storage costs.

In this context, the three standards IEC 62932-1:2020, IEC-62932-2:2020 and IEC 62932-2:2020 have already been developed and published, covering general aspects, test methods and safety aspects of redox flow batteries.

In opinion of the German National Committee, a standard regarding electrolyte for vanadium flow batteries is therefore necessary due to the importance of the topic and the reasons mentioned above