February 25, 2021
Google Spinoff Malta Nabs $50M Series B for Thermal Long-Duration Storage
Malta has raised a $50 million Series B round to bring its super-long-duration energy storage to market, the company said Wednesday. The startup spun out of Google parent company Alphabet’s moonshot factory, X, in 2018. Many startups tackling energy storage breakthroughs have looked to batteries and other electrochemical devices. Malta turned instead to thermal energy: It uses grid power to compress air for storage in hot molten salts and cold antifreeze liquid. A heat engine later converts the energy back to electricity for consumption. This apparatus, in theory, allows for storing power economically on much longer timescales than is feasible with the lithium-ion batteries prevalent today.
