Q&A with Landon Mossburg, CEO and Co-Founder of Peak Energy

The rapidly evolving landscape of renewable energy means that effective and scalable energy storage solutions are crucial for ensuring a sustainable future. 

As highlighted previously at Energy Digital, established brands and industry giants are big drivers of this revolution, but the presence and impact of startups should not be overlooked. One of those at the forefront of this revolution is Peak Energy.

Founded in 2023 by ex-Tesla Director Landon Mossburg and Cameron Dales, formerly of ENOVIX and Lockheed Martin, Peak Energy is a pioneering company dedicated to industrialising sodium-ion battery technology. With extensive backgrounds in scaling iconic energy and mobility companies such as Accenture, Northvolt and KPMG, both executives bring a wealth of expertise to the table.

In this exclusive Q&A, Landon — a leader passionate about energy and building solutions to address the most pressing energy challenges — shares his insights on the critical issues facing the energy storage sector today, from the advantages of sodium-ion over lithium-ion batteries to the challenges of scaling battery startups in the US, as well as Peak Energy’s strategic vision for ensuring a renewable future.

Q. Hi Landon. In your own words, what is Peak Energy?

Peak Energy’s mission is to industrialise sodium-ion technology. We are the first American venture to advance globally proven sodium-ion battery systems as the storage standard for the new era of renewable energy on a resilient grid.

We launched from stealth in the fall of last year following a US$10m funding round led by Eclipse, with significant participation from strategic partner TDK Ventures.

Renewables are on track to become the largest source of global electricity generation by early 2025 according to the International Energy Agency (IEA), but without affordable, reliable utility-scale storage for the grid, we can’t fully realise the benefits of clean energy due to their intermittency in output. 

While the typical path for a startup in this space might be to spend years in the lab focused on R&D before going to market with a viable product, we’re taking a very different approach. We’re advancing a globally-proven technology that we can scale-up right out of the gate to bring a lower cost, safer and more sustainable solution to the energy storage problem. 

And we’re going to do it years ahead of anyone else. We plan to begin deploying our sodium-ion systems in 2025 while building a domestic giga-scale battery factory scheduled to be operational in 2027.

Q. What specific advantages does sodium-ion technology offer over lithium-ion batteries in terms of safety, efficiency and scalability?

Lithium supply chains are already incredibly constrained and sourcing the material can be extremely difficult and expensive. Lithium is economically volatile, meaning price spikes in two to five years could cost providers millions of dollars. Sodium-ion’s supply chain is much more stable and easier to manage and the material itself has a more robust safety profile, is less susceptible to thermal runaway and is more cost effective.

Sodium is fundamentally cheaper — 40-50% cheaper, in fact. This means the cost of energy will go down and the upside for end-users is high. Battery and energy experts around the world understand the next big milestone in batteries lies with sodium-ion.

Likely the biggest selling point of sodium-ion batteries, however, is its scalability. Lithium-ion batteries have proven to be an excellent solution for storage on smaller scales, like EVs and electronics, because of their high energy density. However, this high energy density is a double-edged sword that makes this technology difficult and potentially unsafe to deploy at massive scale.

Most countries outside of China also don’t have the domestic infrastructure or capabilities to mine and refine lithium into batteries at scale. Sodium-ion solutions directly offset these scaling issues because the element is inexpensive, abundant and readily available.

Q. How does Peak Energy envision sodium-ion technology contributing to the realisation of a reliable and scalable energy storage infrastructure?

We believe that without a fully scaled sodium-ion storage solution like we’re building at Peak, a complete transition to renewable energy will be nearly impossible. To establish a reliable and safe infrastructure, it’s important to realise not all battery chemistries are created equal.

While an excellent option for EVs and consumer electronics, lithium is impractical for grid-scale storage due to its limited availability, harmful extraction methods and high cost. In order to meet the global climate goal of net zero by 2050, all technology powering the renewable energy transition needs to be economical, accessible and scalable.

Sodium-ion checks these boxes and more. It’s an inexpensive, abundant and domestically available commodity — unlike lithium, a mineral critically limited by fragile supply chains, volatile prices and damaging extraction methods.

We envision in the coming years that sodium-ion will be globally recognised as the best solution for large scale storage needs. Renewable energy is growing and without storage that can keep up with rapid scaling, projects will be delayed and ambitious climate goals cannot be achieved. 

Q. What is Peak Energy's strategy for overcoming barriers to manufacturing sodium-ion batteries and accelerating the transition to affordable energy storage solutions?

The company is taking a strategic three step approach to making sodium-ion storage a staple in renewable energy. First, through 2025, we’ll look to deploy sodium-ion ESS to leading IPPs and utilities using cells currently in production in China. In our next phase, which comes online in 2027, Peak Energy will scale the first US-based sodium-ion battery cell gigafactory.

Finally, by 2030, we plan to cut-in proprietary innovations on both the cell and system level. Through research and development, our goal is to further build on our lead in providing the lowest cost/kWh to further incentivise the adoption of this technology.

It takes time to create a national supply chain and in order to do it right, we want to be strategic. Approaching this in phases allows us to enter the market with real products starting next year in order to build confidence with customers and scale our supply chains ahead of expected advancements in the technology in the coming years.

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