Post by Michèle Knodt

Today was a truly special day 🎉: we officially hit the button 🔴 to launch a new chapter in sustainable energy storage. With the official funding notification presented by Minister Kaweh Mansoori, I had the pleasure of joining an incredible team to inaugurate the Metal Energy Hub (MEH) at Technische Universität Darmstadt — and I’m genuinely excited to be part of this groundbreaking initiative! Our mission: to advance metal-based energy carriers as a scalable, CO₂-free solution for long-term renewable energy storage. Supported with €3 million from the State of Hessen and the EU, we are now launching a unique one-megawatt pilot plant that demonstrates how iron powder can serve as a safe, loss-free, and climate-neutral energy storage medium at semi-industrial scale — a real gamechanger for seasonal energy storage and for transforming existing power plant infrastructure. Today’s opening, including an impressive tour of the facility, highlighted the enormous potential of this initiative: bringing together research, industry, and policy to accelerate innovations with real-world impact. I’m excited for the journey ahead — and to help demonstrate that metallic energy carriers don’t just work in the lab, but also in industrial environments, where they may become a key enabling technology for the energy transition. 📸 In the picture from Elena Dröge (from left to right): Professorin Michèle Knodt, Professor Andreas Dreizler, Professor Thomas Walther (Vizepräsident der TU Darmstadt), Wirtschaftsminister Kaweh Mansoori, Professor Christian Hasse (Projektkoordinator) und Professor Bernd Epple.