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/daily ·21 OCT 2026 ·WEDNESDAY ·2 MIN READ ·6 STORIES

Wednesday: 400 Wh/kg, Anode-Free Sodium, New York Goes Thermal

Chery published the most specific solid-state manufacturing roadmap yet from a major automaker, Mana Battery won an award for removing the anode from sodium-ion entirely, and New York approved geothermal district heating at utility scale.

01 / The Day

WEDNESDAY 21 OCT 2026, ranked

06

Chery Unveils 400 Wh/kg Solid-State Cell and Pilot Production Line

At its 2026 Global Innovation Conference, Chery published the Rhinoceros Battery roadmap: the Rhinoceros S all-solid-state cell reaches 400 Wh/kg using a sulfide electrolyte and high-nickel cathode, operates from -40°C to 100°C, survives 200°C hot-box testing, and is entering pilot production on a 0.5 GWh line commissioning through 2027.

  • 400 Wh/kg gravimetric energy density; sulfide electrolyte paired with high-nickel ternary cathode; -40°C to 100°C operating window
  • 200°C hot-box thermal runaway test survival is a key automotive qualification milestone; 0.5 GWh pilot line commissioning underway for 60Ah cells
  • Alongside solid-state, a liquid cell variant achieving 12C ultra-fast charging is on the same production roadmap
Why it mattersAt 400 Wh/kg with a documented thermal profile and a pilot line in commissioning, Chery's is the most operationally specific solid-state roadmap published by a major automaker in 2026.
01 carnewschina.com↗

Mana Battery's Anode-Free Sodium-Ion Wins Battery Show Innovation Award

Mana Battery received Battery Innovation of the Year at The Battery Show North America for its anode-free sodium-ion cell, which eliminates hard-carbon anodes entirely by plating metallic sodium in situ directly onto current collectors during charging, using a proprietary electrolyte.

  • Anode-free design removes hard carbon — the dominant cost and supply constraint in sodium-ion — from the cell architecture
  • Metallic sodium plates directly onto current collectors in situ using a proprietary liquid electrolyte; no active anode material is present before first charge
  • Active joint development agreements with battery manufacturers confirmed; commercialisation pending further cycle-life validation
Why it mattersRemoving the anode from sodium-ion removes the last major cost floor that prevented it from being structurally cheaper than LFP at scale — if cycle life validates, the economics change fundamentally.
02 thebatteryshow.com↗

New York Approves Its First Utility-Scale Geothermal Thermal Networks

New York regulators approved the state's first two utility-scale geothermal thermal networks — shared neighbourhood-scale underground pipe loops that replace individual gas furnaces with a common heat exchange system, as part of the state's mandatory building electrification programme.

  • Projects cover multiple city blocks per network, replacing individual gas heating via shared underground heat exchange infrastructure
  • Thermal network design delivers equivalent heat output to conventional gas systems via ground-source heat exchange at neighbourhood scale
  • Approved under New York's All-Electric Buildings Act; utility-scale thermal networks are the regulatory-cleared pathway for dense urban housing decarbonisation
Why it mattersResidential heating is roughly 30% of US natural gas demand; utility-scale thermal networks in a major city are the missing piece between individual heat pump retrofits and block-level decarbonisation.
03 canarymedia.com↗

Rondo Energy and Rio Tinto Begin Design Work on 360 MWh Industrial Thermal Storage

Rondo Energy and Rio Tinto started engineering and design for a 360 MWh thermal energy storage system at a Rio Tinto site in Australia, targeting direct replacement of fossil fuel combustion in ore-processing industrial heat with stored renewable electricity.

  • 360 MWh Rondo Heat Battery stores excess renewable electricity as high-temperature heat for continuous industrial process use
  • Rio Tinto site targets direct decarbonisation of ore-processing heat demand — one of the harder-to-electrify industrial categories
  • Engineering and design phase precedes final investment decision; would be among the largest industrial thermal storage deployments globally if built
Why it mattersIndustrial process heat is roughly 20% of global CO2 emissions — Rondo's heat battery technology with a tier-one mining partner de-risks the most significant hard-to-abate category.
04 energy-storage.news↗

Foresight Group Acquires Nordic Countries' Largest Battery Storage System

Foresight Group purchased the 100 MW / 400 MWh Nivala BESS in Finland — the largest standalone battery storage system in the Nordic countries — from FRV through its FEIP II dedicated European infrastructure fund.

  • 100 MW / 400 MWh LFP system at Nivala in central Finland; commissioned to provide frequency regulation in the Nordic synchronous electricity grid
  • Foresight's FEIP II is a European infrastructure fund specialising in late-stage operational clean energy assets, not development-stage projects
  • Transaction adds to a growing secondary market for operational BESS in Europe, distinct from the development pipeline
Why it mattersInstitutional infrastructure capital pricing a 400 MWh operational BESS as a mature infrastructure asset — not a venture bet — is the signal that utility-scale storage has crossed into mainstream investment-grade territory.
05 energy-storage.news↗

Dominion Energy Files Plan for 3.5 GW of Battery Storage in PJM

Dominion Energy submitted an integrated resource plan detailing 3.5 GW of battery energy storage to be built in the PJM Interconnection over 20 years, explicitly citing AI data centre load growth in Northern Virginia as the primary driver alongside renewable integration requirements.

  • 3.5 GW of BESS planned over a 20-year IRP horizon in Virginia and surrounding PJM service territory
  • AI data centre load growth in Northern Virginia explicitly cited as the demand driver requiring dispatchable 24/7 storage to back intermittent renewables
  • IRP filing moves storage from discretionary capex to ratepayer-supported investment as a regulatory planning commitment
Why it mattersWhen a regulated utility formally commits 3.5 GW of storage in an IRP, the projects that would deliver it move from discretionary to ratepayer-supported — the filing is the funding mandate.
06 energy-storage.news↗
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/FRI 30 OCTLG and Tesla; Sodium Goes National; BYD Goes European/THU 29 OCTCATL goes big, sodium-ion finds its data centre customer, and China owns electrolysers/WED 28 OCTWednesday: Virtual Gigawatts, Weird Reactors, One Surrender/TUE 27 OCTSolar Tops Nuclear, and the Grid Keeps Moving/MON 26 OCT2026-10-26/SUN 25 OCTWhen the data centres blink/SAT 24 OCTKorea's grid flipped, Google's running a power plant/FRI 23 OCTSonnen Falls, Waratah Scales, BNEF Calls 2026 Peak Storage/THU 22 OCTGigawatts of intent, from Kentucky to the outback/WED 21 OCTWednesday: 400 Wh/kg, Anode-Free Sodium, New York Goes Thermal/TUE 20 OCTSolid-state graduates, seafloor sparks/MON 19 OCTSolar Records, AI Batteries, and a Geothermal First/SUN 18 OCTGrid Foundations/SAT 17 OCTTechnology War Saturday/FRI 16 OCTThe Build vs. the Setback/THU 15 OCTThe Energy Brief — October 15, 2026/WED 14 OCTCells and Gigafactories/TUE 13 OCTTuesday dispatch/MON 12 OCTThe residential battery surge and the storage giant stirring/SUN 11 OCTThe chemistry and the credibility/SAT 10 OCTSaturday Grid