Cheesecake Energy Limited
Cheesecake Energy Limited
Established in 2016, innovative start-up, Cheesecake, was founded by five acronym-loving engineers. As the company’s technology brings together two forms of storage – generation integrated energy storage (GIES) and compressed air energy storage (CAES) – the name for the project was GIESCAES. Spoken aloud, the acronym sounds a bit like Cheesecake, giving rise to Cheesecake Energy.
Spotting a gap in the market, Cheesecake noted that commercial and industrial clients were under increasing pressure to decarbonise their operations in order to meet Net Zero targets. With businesses rapidly discovering that upgrading local distribution network connections was both time consuming and costly, there was a demand for an energy storage solution which users could install onsite.
While most energy storage systems are dependent on expensive and environmentally damaging batteries, industry trailblazers, Cheesecake has established itself quickly within the East Midlands energy ecosystem and beyond, building their reputation on the development of a unique energy storage system, the eTanker, which is designed to facilitate long-duration energy storage sustainably.
Building Better – the world’s greenest battery
While at present the quantity of power generated rarely exceeds Britain’s power demand, a surge would threaten to throw off the delicate balance between supply and demand currently exerted on Britain’s electricity grid. With an energy surplus forecast coming directly from the government’s new energy security strategy, energy storage technologies, such as batteries and electrolysers are vitally important.
Cheesecake’s eTanker energy storage system not only costs 30-40% less than current market leader, lithium ion batteries, but crucially, the production of the eTanker allows Cheesecake to prioritise sustainability from design through to manufacture.
Created by repurposing ex-service truck diesel engines into air compressors, Cheesecake’s technology is not only cost-effective, it ensures that the product process leaves a minimal environmental footprint. Because it uses compressed air and thermal energy storage to achieve high efficiency, the eTanker has a dramatically lower environmental impact.
The eTanker works by using electricity from the grid or a renewable source like solar to charge the system, powering an electric motor to drive an air compressor which creates high pressure air, and a lot of heat. This high-temperature heat is captured and stored separately in a thermal store, alongside the high-pressure compressed air held in an air tank. When the electricity is needed, the battery can be discharged by running the process in reverse, using the heat in the thermal store to re-heat the high-pressure air, and expanding it through the expanders, which drives a generator at constant speed, creating high quality AC electricity.
Presenting a cost-effective alternative to traditional energy storage methods, and one which requires no harmful chemicals, this technology has the potential to be ‘the world’s greenest battery’. BDB Pitmans is proud to supply legal advice to this ground-breaking organisation.
To find out more about Cheesecake’s latest projects, visit their website here: https://cheesecakeenergy.com/
