July 1, 2021: As the weeks disappear between now and the 2021 BCI Convention + Power Mart, to be held in San Diego on September 22-25, keynote speakers have been announced along with the deadline for innovation award entries to be submitted.

First up is Mark Mills, senior fellow of the Manhattan Institute and co-founder of the Montrose Land energy-tech venture fund. His presentation, ‘Mines, Minerals and “Green” Energy: A Reality Check’, is listed for Thursday September 23.

The second keynote presentation is by Imre Gyuk, director for energy storage research with the US Department of Energy. He will talk about ‘Energy Storage for the Future Grid’ on Friday, September 24.

Entries for the annual innovation award are also being called for, with submissions to be in no later than July 9.

The last winner of the award that was created in honour of the late East Penn CEO Sally Breidegam Miksiewicz, who died while out running, was ArcActive, for its AACarbon anodes. This was held in 2019. The Covid outbreak meant that the awards were not held in 2020.

With the cancellation of the last physical BCI event, scheduled for Las Vegas last April and replaced with a successful online version, September will be the first major in-person lead battery industry conference for more than two years.