October 21, 2019
The Biggest U.S. Battery Is 16 Years Old
The biggest battery in America has been quietly at work for almost 16 years in a far more remote corner of America: a warehouse in central Alaska. The 46-megawatt battery, in Fairbanks, uses a chemistry that’s largely gone the way of fax machines. It’s old enough that its operators can’t find replacement parts for some components. But it still works, keeping the lights on in the city of 32,000 near the Arctic Circle, preventing 59 blackouts last year alone.