Firefly Energy Receives Additional $3.3 Million Army Contract
Firefly Energy announced that it has signed a $3.3 million contract extension for continuing enhancement of its first two advanced battery technology designs. This funding comes in addition to more than $7 million the company has received to date under its original contract to adapt the company’s next generation microcell foam battery technologies for military applications.
Today’s high-tech military vehicles increasingly depend upon sophisticated electronic devices to accomplish their missions. These devices have incremental energy requirements that severely draw down traditional lead acid batteries. This – along with extreme vibration, varying temperatures, and other stress factors inherent to these applications – cause these vehicle batteries to fail prematurely.
Firefly’s breakthrough microcell battery technology enables an extraordinary battery performance in these advanced energy applications, by delivering 4-6 times the lifetime energy compared to traditional Valve Regulated Lead Acid (VRLA) batteries. Building on Firefly Energy’s current technology design that enables military equipment to utilize batteries for extensive cycling and energy discharges, Firefly Energy will now significantly increase the power and further enhance the available energy in the military 6T battery case; the 6T is the vehicular battery used across the US and NATO militaries.
This Army contract extension continues development support of Firefly’s 3D and 3D<sub2 technologies. The 3D technology comprises the replacement of traditional lead acid battery negative lead metal electrodes with a three dimensional high surface area microcell foam negative electrode, that unleashes the historically unrealized high power potential of lead acid chemistry. Firefly’s second generation 3D2 battery technology replaces both negative and positive lead metal electrodes with the microcell foam material, providing the potential to match energy density numbers (energy per unit weight) at a delivered pack level that are currently only realized in less environmentally-friendly (and much more expensive) lithium and nickel chemistries.
"This government funding will allow Firefly to continue optimization of its technologies and respond to critical and evolving military combat vehicle operational requirements, assuring their suitability and exceptional performance for military applications," said Firefly Energy CEO Edward Williams.
