Carbon-Based Thermal Batteries

GrafTech International and Antora Energy announced a strategic collaboration to develop carbon-based materials at GrafTech's St. Marys, Pennsylvania, facility for use in Antora's thermal batteries. These batteries store low-cost electricity as heat in insulated carbon blocks and deliver it around the clock as heat or electricity. The partnership has already restarted eight bake furnaces at the facility and created new jobs across plant operations, machining and maintenance. The collaboration follows Antora's oversubscribed $550 million Series C round and the recent commissioning of Project Big Stone, one of the world's largest battery storage systems, which is now delivering power to a biofuels facility in South Dakota. The partnership signals that domestic manufacturing capacity built for legacy carbon industries is being redirected to support next-generation energy storage supply chains.