Premier and Minister for the Olympic and paralympic games, The Honourable Annastacia Palaszczuk, the Minister for Energy, Renewables and Hydrogen and Minister for Public Works and Procurement, The Honourable Mick de Brenni and the Minister for Resources, The Honourable Scott Stewart attended the official opening of Australia’s first Vanadium Battery electrolyte manufacturing facility in Townsville today.
The Queensland Premier said “I want to see vanadium mined in Queensland, processed in Queensland and made into Vanadium batteries here in Queensland”. Vecco Group’s $26 million Townsville facility will produce the electrolyte needed to manufacture vanadium batteries that will be critical to support the world’s transition to renewable energy.
Vanadium batteries in comparison to lithium-ion batteries last longer at up to 20 years, have lower rates of degradation and are almost 100% recyclable. The Vanadium will not degrade over time and although the battery casing has a warranted life of over 20 years, the electrolyte does not loose its charge and be 100% recycled into a new battery.
Vecco Group Managing Director, Tom Northcott said “Vecco Group’s vanadium battery manufacturing facility is the first in Australia and joins a growing list of plants being constructed and operated around the world in the USA, Europe, Japan, China and Korea.”
“This facility commences operations this week making battery electrolyte for large scale vanadium flow batteries, such as the battery we are delivering for Energex in partnership with Sumitomo.
Within 2 years, we will be mining vanadium, processing vanadium and manufacturing vanadium batteries in Queensland which will create over 500 regional jobs.”
“The vanadium battery industry is critical to supporting the QLD energy transition by providing the capacity to support our growing renewable energy assets.”
Vanadium batteries will play a significant role in the Queensland SuperGrid given the proven technology is being seen as a superior, more reliable and non explosive solution for baseload energy.
Townsville MP and Minister for Resources Scott Stewart said “There is enormous potential for Vanadium mining and production in North Queensland as demand for Vanadium batteries continues to rise, and we create a whole supply chain across North Queensland”.
