neat!
Caution marketing-gloss, but interesting claims: How We Stack Up | ESS, Inc.
Would it kill manufacturers of new technology to actually give the stuff they’re comparing against a decent representation? I see the same thing when lead acid gets brought up - “Lithium is soooo much better than this version of lead acid that represents the cheapest option from 20 years ago!” They really beat up on lithium nonsensically so to make their points, when it’s absolutely not required.
I note they say nothing about round trip energy efficiency…
They also have this:
“Save up to 15% or more using our newly developed methods for evaluating cost efficiency!” doesn’t speak very highly of their cost efficiency…
Anyway, if they don’t suck, they’ve got some very real advantages in terms of materials used, and flow batteries being flow batteries, they have advantages in terms of separating out power handling and energy storage capacity. If it’s iron and salt water in various configurations, it’s certainly unlikely to be hazardous, and unlikely to have enough energy density to get exciting (another perk of flooded lead acid, they lack the energy density to be exciting).
But with the weird metrics they’re pulling out to justify them, I’d wager that the actual engineering details aren’t that amazing compared to state of the art. Time will tell.
… but, man, I’d forgotten just how bad CleanTechnica’s writing was. “Barf out manufacturer specs and claims without validating them, whine about how the sun is free, and ignore literally everything else involved in turning it into year-round high grade energy.” 
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