Google has announced a strategic partnership with Italian company Energy Dome, focused on deploying Energy Dome's CO2 Battery technology across Google's operations. This collaboration, set to unfold throughout July 2025, aims to enhance the reliability and scalability of renewable energy storage.
The core of the initiative is Energy Dome's CO2 Battery system, which utilizes the thermodynamic transformation of carbon dioxide to store and dispatch energy. This closed-loop system compresses CO2 into a liquid state when renewable energy is abundant and converts it back into gas to drive turbines and generate electricity during periods of high demand. This technology offers energy storage durations of 8 to 24 hours, significantly longer than the typical 4-hour limit of lithium-ion batteries, addressing a key challenge in the widespread adoption of renewables.
Energy Dome's technology has been proven with a commercial-scale plant in Sardinia, Italy, a 20-megawatt, 200-megawatt-hour facility that has been operational for over three years, supplying energy to the Italian grid. The use of off-the-shelf components in the design facilitates rapid global implementation. This partnership aligns with Google's commitment to operating on 24/7 carbon-free energy by 2030, aiming to create a more stable and sustainable power supply for its global infrastructure.
The long-duration energy storage market is projected to grow substantially, with industry forecasts suggesting a potential reach of 8 terawatts by 2040. This collaboration validates Energy Dome's technology and signals a broader industry trend towards more robust and sustainable energy storage solutions, crucial for grid reliability and the global transition to cleaner energy systems.