Spirax-Sarco to invest £3m for 15% stake in Kyoto Group

Spirax-Sarco Engineering said on Thursday that it will invest £3m in return for a 15% interest in Norwegian thermal battery company Kyoto Group.

As part of the deal, Spirax will enter into agreements to accelerate the decarbonisation of industrial process heat with Kyoto's Heatcube, a molten salt thermal energy storage solution.

The partnership agreement covers the commercial and technological development of electrical heaters, as well as other Spirax-Sarco Engineering technologies, for existing and future generations of Heatcube to support commercialisation and market adoption.

Subject to approval at Kyoto's annual meeting on 30 June, Spirax, Kyoto and Spain’s Iberdrola will enter into investment, partnership and commercial agreements "to support the development of Heatcube as a world leading technology".

Spirax has been working with Kyoto since 2021, providing the electric immersion heater and power control systems that power Heatcube.

Chief executive Nicholas Anderson said: "Enabling the decarbonisation of critical industrial processes is central to our group's purpose. We have been actively investing in new-to-world decarbonisation solutions through product development since 2020.

"As we already provide some of the technology that sits behind Heatcube, getting actively involved in supporting Kyoto through direct investment and partnering is a natural extension of our activity in this area."