Ice Energy filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in December, in a setback for small-scale thermal energy storage.
As lithium-ion batteries proliferated for grid storage, a small contingent of entrepreneurs pitched an alternative technology: thermal storage, which preheats or precools a building to cut electrical usage during expensive peak hours. The technology is simple and cheap and has helped large commercial buildings for years. Ice Energy wanted to extend it to small businesses and homes.
It won several utility contracts to help reduce peak demand by installing Ice Bear devices on commercial customer sites, expanding into the residential market with its smaller Ice Cub product.
Ice Energy filed for bankruptcy with the Central District of California on December 17; the filing scheduled a meeting of creditors for January 27. The document offers few other details about the circumstances.
The company’s website is no longer active, and COO Marcel Christians did not respond to a call for comment.
Chapter 7 means the company will liquidate its assets rather than trying to reconstitute and exit bankruptcy. That’s an abrupt change of fortune for a company that had a clear path ahead of it, with a plan to execute on contracts it had already won with creditworthy utilities.
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