B2U (second-life battery company) executes a second battery project in ERCOT with a strategic supply agreement from Waymo, expanding stationary storage for grid support.
B2U Storage Solutions, a California-based company, has brought its second Texas "second-life" energy storage project to commercial operations with the 28-MWh Bexar Martinez battery energy storage installation in CPS Energy territory near San Antonio. Like the company's other Texas project and several installations deployed in California, the San Antonio facility is built entirely from repurposed electric vehicle batteries. B2U reports it has at least 100 MWh of operational second-life battery installations in service.
The Bexar Martinez installation is rated at approximately 10 MW of power capacity, making it eligible for faster energization under ERCOT's interconnection process for small generators. The project contains more than 700 batteries previously used to power electric vehicles.
Despite EV sales slowing this year following the sunsetting of the federal purchase credit last September, B2U CEO Freeman Hall told Utility Dive that the company has "secured significant volumes of battery capacity suitable for repurposing" and expects available supply to reach "many GWh annually" in the years ahead. B2U is working on several additional "Texas 10" projects in ERCOT that could begin construction as soon as this year and provide grid services in 2027. The company's total pipeline exceeds 1,000 MWh across front-of-meter and behind-the-meter projects in ERCOT and other markets, and B2U expects to deploy more than 50 MWh in ERCOT over the next six months.
Second-life batteries currently account for less than 3% of deployed energy storage capacity, according to Anurag Srivastava, an electrical engineering professor at West Virginia University who spoke with IEEE Spectrum in July. However, they could reach 20% to 25% market share in the 2030s if battery health diagnostics continue to improve.
In June, B2U announced a supply agreement with Waymo, the autonomous mobility company, under which B2U will repurpose batteries from Waymo vehicles as they age out of its fleet. The agreement will supply B2U with "hundreds of megawatts of storage capacity" over time, with much of it connected to grids in communities where Waymo operates.
Hall noted that recent data suggesting EV batteries degrade more slowly under real-world conditions than earlier laboratory tests predicted will likely boost EV adoption in the long term. Geotab's 2024 analysis of 11 EV models found an average annual degradation rate of 1.8%, leaving the average car battery with approximately 91% usable capacity after five years. Hall said other adoption tailwinds—including improved battery capacity and range, and reduced battery costs—will boost available supply of second-life batteries over time. "Reduced annual degradation benefits both the automotive industry and [the] repurposed BESS ecosystem," he said.
B2U is currently running its two ERCOT installations on a merchant basis while it completes tolling agreements with third parties. Hall said installed costs for a typical B2U project come in as much as 40% lower than "competing BESS solutions … with equivalent reliability and performance," and the projects qualify for the Section 48(e) investment tax credit's domestic content bonus adder.