Abstract: Due to inherent safety, long cycle life, environmental friendliness and easiness in the state of charge monitoring, vanadium flow batteries (VRB) have been regarded as one of the promising technologies for large scale energy storage applications. In this paper, technological challenges are briefly reviewed first in the commercialization of vanadium flow batteries. Future research needs are then proposed. The most recent progress is then presented in VRB stack structural design, battery system integration and demonstration, especially the collaborative efforts made by the VRB research group of Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP) and Dalian Rongke Power Co. Ltd. (RKP).

Key words: vanadium flow battery, stack, battery system, high power density