Batteries could go in the basement of skyscrapers or provide backup power for entire neighborhoods. The biggest challenge of all: batteries so powerful and reliable, they could replace power plants.

“Energy storage can be used to reduce the total number of power plants that you have a need for on your grid,” said Kamath. “This is because you have to build power plants to satisfy the peak demand at any given time of the year.”

Here’s something you may not know about electricity: It’s made in real time. Turn on a light switch and generators are producing that electricity in response. There’s no warehouse that stores electricity. As a result, parts of the grid are built to be put in service only a few days of the year when energy use is at its peak, during the hottest days of the year, when air conditioners are blasting. Peaking turbines accommodate this demand. “Literally in America the median peaking turbine is running only 2 percent of the time,” said Giudice. “Can you imagine running a hotel you didn’t keep full except for 2 percent of the time? It’s a very expensive proposition.”

Energy storage — and perhaps the right battery — could change the existing grid. A battery could serve as an energy warehouse, storing electricity during nonpeak hours and then sending it out when people most need it. It would mean no more expensive power plants that work only during peak hours. “By eliminating the peak generation and using storage, it could ultimately save some dollars,” said Joseph Carbonara, a project manager in research and development at New York’s Con Edison.

Power companies like Con Edison are paying close attention to the new technology. It’s working with several battery companies, including Ambri, to help them test their products. But the technology isn’t quite there. It will take another five years for the batteries to be tested thoroughly enough that a utility would be amenable to incorporating it into the grid. “We worked with others that are gearing their technologies to be low cost, reliable and safe,” said Carbonara. “At this point, may the best technology win.”

One of the biggest prohibitive aspects of these batteries is cost. Sadoway says inexpensive manufacturing is key. But the territory is so new that manufacturing the battery is as experimental as the battery itself. As a result, Ambri brought in experts from Detroit’s auto industry to build robots to assemble the batteries. The project is in a prototype phase, but Sadoway believes it will give Ambri a competitive edge over other batteries, like Tesla’s lithium ion.

“The entire robotic device, it’s on the order of $10 million dollars, not a billion dollars like a lithium ion battery plant,” said Sadoway.

He envisions a business model in which manufacturing plants are built around the world, using local materials to build batteries. He believes it will be key to bringing electricity to developing countries.

“If you’ve got electricity in the developing world, what comes with electricity? Well, now you’ve got devices that can power things like water purification that can lead to things like sanitation, which means now you are leading something other than a life of mere survival,” said Sadoway

But there is still much to be done before that vision can be realized.

“Everything has to be invented,” said Sadoway. “We think it’s doable, but we’ve got to prove it.”