Co-Founder in Residence, Local Long Duration Energy Storage

This is an open application for expressions of interest. Active recruitment for the role will begin later this year.

Join Us as a Co-Founder-in-Residence in Climate

At DSV, we are always on the lookout for entrepreneurial individuals with technical and commercial domain expertise with keen interest in founding, and building a global scale, impact driven, high growth company from ground up (full-time).

We are seeking expressions of interest from experienced industry, startup and/or new science or engineering based technology development professionals from anywhere in the world to work with us on addressing the local long duration energy storage challenge.

Every second of every day we’re using electricity. Even while we sleep industry churns out materials, hospitals care for our loved ones, and data centres protect our treasured terabytes of photos, calendars, and files. As we decarbonise our energy systems, our dependence on electricity is going to increase as we change the way we power transport and create heat. We need to mitigate the 37% of global greenhouse gas emissions from electricity production while at the same time preparing for electricity demand to triple by 2050 under a net-zero scenario, according to BNEF.

But there’s more. Net-zero power production comes with its own challenges. Nuclear fission plants take decades to build and require vast amount of capital expenditure. Some renewables, such as hydroelectric, geothermal, and tidal are geographically constrained. Because of this, many have placed their hopes in solar and wind due to their drastically reduced costs, but even these face the challenge of intermittency, meaning they’re not always available when you need them.

To solve the challenge of intermittency, we can either adjust our electricity demand patterns to match those of renewable generation or we must develop methods to shift power generation in time. Demand response has a role to play in the future energy system, but globally, it will not be sufficient. There will always be certain base loads which will require constant and high power, for example, industrial manufacturing of metals, cement production, and chemical processing, along with other industries.

To give an indication of the scale of this challenge: currently, the global manufacturing of metals alone accounts for 10% of annual greenhouse gas emissions. Many of the processes involved in the production of products, which are crucial to clean future growth, require constant electrical power supply. This electricity demand can be in the order of 10s of MW to GWs. We need solutions which provide reliable and resilient electricity under all circumstances with net-zero emissions.

Long duration energy storage solutions, able to cope with seasonal variations in renewable generation, are needed to enable the integration of renewable energy into industry electricity supply chains.

At DSV, we want to design a long duration energy storage system which can offer reliable, resilient power to high power base load demand. This solution will enable the provision of cost competitive constant clean electricity throughout the year.

In recent years, innovation efforts have been focused on lightweight, short duration batteries (particularly relevant to the electric vehicle industry). Now, some attention is turning to the storage of hydrogen in salt caverns for long duration energy storage. However, we believe there is a gap. Commercial solutions for long duration energy storage and industrial base load power demand are lacking. Thus, we want to work with you to develop a solution, techno-economically suited to the constant high electrical power needs of industry.

Although high power industry is the primary customer, solutions in this space will be applicable to the energy system more generally to afford society year-round reliable electricity.

Requirements

Most suitable candidates will likely meet multiple of the following criteria:

• PhD or equivalent industry R&D know-how focused on energy systems and storage, with a background in materials science, chemistry, physics, or engineering;
• In-depth knowledge of state of the art (SOTA) technologies and constraints in at least one of the following areas: flow batteries, alternative battery chemistries, net-zero chemical fuels e.g. hydrogen, or materials for nuclear power;
• You have broad expertise in storage technology options including their current limitations and a understanding of their first principles of operation and/or broad knowledge base on energy storage solutions to draw upon;
• Industry specific know-how, commercial knowledge (e.g. strategic partnerships, manufacturing, procurement etc.) and network within Energy/Utilities/Grid/Renewables;
• Experience in building and scaling new technologies from concept to demonstration;
• Experience in raising funds from early stage investors/VC;
• Experience in building and scaling a high-growth enterprise (leadership/c-suite roles).

Note that we’re not yet actively hiring for a Founder in Residence position(s) for this opportunity. However, we are actively seeking expressions of interest from candidates who are highly selective about their next move. If you’re determined to explore venture creation opportunities in this area, share your application and we’ll get in touch when it’s launched. We may reach out to you sooner if your experience highly aligns with the expertise we’re after.

Benefits

By joining DSV, you’ll be joining a team of operators who have founded companies and led translation of science at some of the most respected universities, charities, funds and government agencies. 2/3 of the team have founded or led a company at C-suite and 65% have a PhD. Our team dedicate several hours every week to each Founder or founding team to provide tailored guidance, resources and feedback covering every aspect of what it takes to successfully launch a new venture from both the tech and commercial perspectives:

• We provide optimised, purpose-built, proprietary tools, resources and processes to help create high-impact ventures from scratch, using our venture creation methodology. Read more about one of our key tools here.
• We draw on opportunity area specific know-how provided by our network of Partners and Advisors;
• We provide £250k investment governed by our Investment Committee to incorporate the new venture and develop early proof-of-concept data that’s needed to attract high profile non-venture studio VCs. This funding is also key to get grant funding, which most often needs to be matched with private investment;
• We provide guaranteed income of £4,166 per month paid to each Founder in Residence as a consultancy fee until the company is launched and the pre-seed investment is secured;
• You and your co-founders will own a majority equity stake in the company;
• We provide continuous support after post spin-out, including fundraising, commercial partnerships, recruitment and team-building (amongst other things); plus
• There are dozens of Founders currently at DSV across sectors working collaboratively and supporting one another - a unique resource to draw on.

ABOUT DSV

Deep Science Ventures is creating a future in which both humans and the planet can thrive.

We use our unique venture creation process to create, spin-out and invest into science companies, combining available scientific knowledge and founder-type scientists into high-impact ventures.

We operate in 4 sectors: Pharmaceuticals, Climate, Agriculture and Computation, tackling the challenges defining those areas by taking a first principles approach and partnering with leading institutions.