MGA Thermal

About

MGA Thermal makes modular graphite-based thermal storage blocks with miscibility-gap alloy that store latent heat (400–700°C) and dispatch high-temperature steam or hot fluid for industrial heat and grid firming.

Mission

MGA Thermal develops a steam-dispatch thermal energy storage technology that stores and dispatches heat as clean steam. The company positions the technology as zero-carbon renewable energy storage for grid and industrial applications and as a behind-the-meter solution to balance utility-scale renewables with distributed energy storage. MGA plans to use recent government funding to continue commissioning its demonstration unit and to scale up toward commercial deployment. Financially, the company received an additional $2.48M from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) following an earlier $1.27M commitment from the same agency. ARENA’s renewed support is presented as reflecting confidence in the technology’s potential to help large industrial players decarbonise processes and manage evolving supply-demand dynamics. MGA says its approach offers a sustainable alternative to fossil-fuel dependent processes by storing and dispatching heat energy in the form of clean steam. MGA Thermal has developed Miscibility Gaps Alloy (MGA) Blocks that absorb and store thermal energy from renewable power to generate long-duration clean steam for hard-to-abate industries and retrofitted power plants. The company built a shipping container-sized demonstration unit that holds 3,700 TES blocks and would store enough energy to power more than 135 homes for 24 hours. During development the team identified areas for improvement, paused operations to address them, and plans to resume commissioning after implementing changes. The new $5.7M capital will be deployed on the next phase of testing to reinstate and prove the scale of the TES system and to produce sufficient high-pressure, high-temperature clean steam for industrial demand. MGA Thermal says it has continued working with numerous industrial partners and clients who cannot rely solely on solar and wind to meet decarbonisation goals and intends to implement on-site TES systems. The company has now raised $28.8M in total through funding and grants, including an $8M top-up in September last year. MGA Thermal aims to abate 30 million tonnes of CO2 by 2030 and was a finalist in the 2023 Startup Daily Best in Tech awards. MGA Thermal’s technology embeds small particles of a miscibility gap alloy within graphite-based blocks, containing molten alloy at operating temperatures of about 400–700°C. Electrical heating elements superheat the alloy, while the graphite matrix stores heat for hours to days with minimal loss. Heat exchangers use a transfer gas to absorb heat from the MGA blocks, producing heated gas or fluid suitable for industrial process heat or to drive a steam turbine for electricity. The company plans to demonstrate steam generation from stored thermal energy via a Medium Duration Thermal Energy Storage (MDTES) pilot at its head office and manufacturing facility near Newcastle, NSW. The pilot has a planned storage capacity of 5 MWh and will demonstrate charging and discharging of up to 500 kW; the total project budget is expected to be $2.85 million. The demonstrator will collect data on charging/discharging behaviour, fluid dynamics and temperature distributions to validate mid-to-long term thermal storage for industrial heating, waste heat capture, and grid firming. MGA Thermal makes modular thermal energy storage blocks that store latent heat in miscibility gap alloy particles embedded in an inert matrix. A stack of 1,000 blocks is roughly the size of a small car and can store enough energy to power about 27 homes for 24 hours; blocks can heat water to drive steam turbines via internal tubing or heat exchangers. The technology is intended to enable grid-scale storage, repurpose aging thermal power plants, supply off-grid and remote sites, and allow households to store rooftop solar energy. The company is establishing a manufacturing plant in New South Wales and plans to double its team over the next 12 months to scale production to hundreds of thousands of blocks per month. MGA Thermal works with partners including Switzerland’s E2S Power AG and U.S.-based Peregrine Turbine Technologies to deploy in Australia, Europe and North America. The company has raised capital to date and is advancing commercialization from its research roots at the University of Newcastle.

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