Hithium unveils the world's first 8-hour-native energy storage solution

Hithium unveiled the world’s first eight-hour native battery energy storage solution, the ∞Power8 6.9MW/55.2MWh, at Eco-Day. Built on an eight-hour long-duration energy storage (LDES) system architecture and supported by an eight-hour battery cell, the solution can adopt a native design from cell to system

The solution is the first to be built for eight-hour LDES, supporting a continuous, all-weather renewable power supply.

Eight-hour LDES has become a key direction for the industry due to its ability to advance grid stability and increase the use of renewable energy. Within long-duration technology pathways, lithium stands out as the optimal choice, and dedicated eight-hour lithium cells are ideal for system-level applications due to their higher integration, efficiency, and stability.

∞Power8 6.9MW/55.2MWh is a turnkey solution, with each highly integrated standard unit delivering 6.9MW of power and 55.2MWh of energy, comprising one medium-voltage module and eight energy storage modules.

The system can decrease on-site construction intensity, increase deployment efficiency by 18%, and reduce land use by 23% by optimising hoisting and cabling. The solution comes preconfigured for standalone energy storage plants, large wind-solar bases, and challenging environments, providing a combined value in:

• Cost reduction: By eliminating large amounts of redundant components, the system increases integration by more than 10% and improves efficiency by over 30%.
• High-efficiency operation: Through intelligent control, thermal-island simulation, and end-to-end active balancing, auxiliary power consumption is reduced by 30%, temperature control precision is increased by 50%, response speed is increased by 20%, and balancing capability is enhanced by 20 times at 97% efficiency. The active balancing strategy alone is capable of saving over $1 million per 1GWh of LDES.
• Safety and reliability: The system incorporates the industry's first mass-produced high-strength steel-belt confinement technology, a rapid dual-valve pressure release design, and new-generation high-performance insulation materials between cells. These materials can withstand temperatures up to 800 °C and 300kPa of pressure without failure. Hithium is also the first company worldwide to pass an open-door fire test, verifying its thermal resilience.

At the centre of the eight-hour native solution is the ∞Cell 1300Ah 8h, created for the 6.9MWh BESS. Each cell provides over four times the capacity of mainstream products and decreases system component count by over 30%.

Hithium also incorporates multilayer protection from materials to system integration, enabling the products to pass safety tests with non-propagating thermal runaway.

The breakthrough in capacity and cost-effectiveness is due to Hithium’s proprietary ultra-thick electrode technology, created by overcoming challenges in long-duration cells, including electrode cracking, slow ion-electron transporting, and challenging electrolyte penetration. In comparison to the previous-generation ∞Cell 1175Ah, the electrode thickness has increased, allowing the eight-hour cell to reduce foil and other power component costs by over 50% versus two-hour cells.