Zhongchu Guoneng (Beijing) Technology Co., Ltd.

Zhongchu Guoneng (Beijing) Technology Co., Ltd. (ZCGN) is the commercial spinout and deployment arm of the Institute of Engineering Thermophysics (IET) at the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). IET has conducted the world’s most advanced research into compressed air energy storage (CAES) for over two decades, developing proprietary advanced adiabatic CAES technology that addresses the primary efficiency limitation of conventional CAES — the loss of heat generated during compression. ZCGN was established to convert this nationally-funded research into a vertically integrated commercial business spanning R&D, engineering design, equipment manufacturing, EPC contracting, and plant operations. The company is based in Beijing and is led by its founding technical team from IET. Chen Haisheng, Director of IET, serves as Chairman of the China Energy Storage Alliance (CNESA) and provides strategic scientific oversight.

CAES technology works by using surplus electricity from the grid to compress air and store it underground in geological formations — in ZCGN’s case, solution-mined salt caverns or artificial mountain caverns. When electricity demand peaks, the compressed air is released, reheated, and expanded through turbines to generate electricity. ZCGN’s advanced adiabatic design captures and stores the heat of compression in thermal storage systems, then uses it to reheat the air during expansion — eliminating or drastically reducing the need for fossil fuel combustion and achieving round-trip efficiencies above 70%. This makes ZCGN’s systems comparable in efficiency to pumped hydro but without the geographic constraints that limit pumped hydro siting.

ZCGN has received CNY 1.66 billion in investment across four funding rounds, with strategic investors including China Development Bank Capital and China Three Gorges New Energy Corporation. The company progressed through a clearly defined sequence of demonstration milestones: the 10 MW Feicheng salt cavern CAES demonstration plant (2021), the first salt cavern CAES ever deployed commercially in China; the 100 MW Zhangjiakou CAES project (2022), the world’s first CAES plant built with a 100,000 m³ artificial cavern rather than a natural salt formation; and the 300 MW/1,800 MWh Feicheng Advanced CAES National Demonstration Project (completed April 2024), which at the time of its commissioning was confirmed as the world’s largest CAES facility by both power rating and energy capacity.

The 300 MW Feicheng project — a $207.8 million investment covering approximately 100,000 m³ of site area — operates at a reported system efficiency of 72.1%, produces approximately 600 GWh of electricity annually, and reduces coal consumption by approximately 190,000 tonnes and CO₂ emissions by approximately 490,000 tonnes per year. Unit costs came in 30% below the earlier 100 MW project, validating the cost reduction trajectory. In February 2026, ZCGN and IET jointly announced the development of the world’s first CAES compressor with a single-unit power exceeding 100 MW, the “Chulong 105,” opening the path to even larger future projects. ZCGN has received approval to develop a 700 MW/4,200 MWh CAES project in Henan Province, which would be the world’s largest energy storage system of any type upon completion.