Brisbane company inks its biggest global deal by cracking US market

A Brisbane company struggling to make headway in its fast-growing sector has just got a massive break that provides an invaluable toehold in North America.

CALIFORNIA DREAMING

A Brisbane battery maker struggling to make headway in the fast-growing sector has just got a massive break.

Redflow announced on Tuesday that it had inked its largest global battery sale to date in a deal that provides an invaluable toehold in North America.

The company is set to supply 192 of its “zinc-bromine flow’’ batteries to a bioenergy plant in California, which has a hugely ambitious state agenda to pivot to renewables and remains a hotbed of innovation as the US transitions to clean power.

Redflow will pocket more than $US1.2m after taxes from the agreement to deliver the two-megawatt energy storage system to the Rialto Bioenergy Facility about 80 km east of Los Angeles.

Redflow CEO Tim Harris

When fully operational, the plant, run by global waste recovery outfit Anaergia, will become North America’s biggest landfill where organic matter is repurposed.

It might get a bit whiffy. After all, the site will eventually convert 700 tons a day of organic waste and 300 tons daily of biosolids into natural gas and fertiliser.

Redflow boss Tim Harris said the batteries, which are considered hardier than the lithium-ion versions used in electric cars, are ideally suited for harsh conditions.

“Our batteries thrive on heat and hard work, which is exactly what Anaergia requires from them,’’ Harris said.

“We are very excited about the potential for Redflow in California and the broader US market.”

The opportunities are clearly enormous, which might explain why the Redflow share price shot up 46 per cent to close at 7.9c.

A bill pending before California legislators would commit the state to fully decarbonise its electricity grid by 2045. To eliminate greenhouse emissions, the state will need more than 150 times its current energy storage capacity built since 2010.

Still, Redflow continues to face plenty of hurdles more than a decade after it floated.

It keeps on piling up huge annual losses, including $3m of red ink in the half-year to December, and has remained afloat thanks largely to a series of capital raisings.