Journal of Power Sources APC and Open Access: Elsevier Pricing, R&P Deals, and Energy Storage Alternatives

JPS is hybrid. You have two routes:

1. Subscription track (default): Your article appears on ScienceDirect behind the paywall. Institutional subscribers access it. You pay $0.
2. Open access track (optional): Your article is immediately free to everyone. You or your funder pays the APC.

Battery and energy storage research has strong industry readership, and most corporate R&D labs and national laboratories maintain ScienceDirect subscriptions. This means your subscription-track paper reaches its core audience without OA. For authors without OA funding, the subscription track is a perfectly viable path.

JPS is a core Elsevier title, meaning it's included in all standard Elsevier Read & Publish deals. This is a major advantage, because Elsevier has the most extensive R&P network of any publisher.

Energy storage research is heavily concentrated at national labs (Argonne, NREL, Sandia in the US; Helmholtz centers in Germany; AIST in Japan). National lab coverage varies. US DOE national labs have their own publishing arrangements that may or may not include Elsevier OA. Check with your lab's library.

The corresponding author's affiliation determines coverage. For multi-lab collaborations, which are common in battery research, make sure the corresponding author is at a covered institution.

Elsevier's standard waiver program applies:

Automatic waivers: Research4Life Group A countries (low-income) receive full APC waivers. Group B countries get approximately 50% discounts.

Hardship waivers: Case-by-case evaluation at the time of acceptance. Elsevier states these don't influence editorial decisions.

No society discounts. JPS doesn't have a sponsoring learned society. This differs from journals like the Journal of the Electrochemical Society, where ECS membership provides publishing discounts.

JPS sits in a crowded field of energy storage journals, each with distinct positioning:

Journal of Power Sources is the workhorse. It covers the full spectrum of energy storage and conversion, from lithium-ion batteries to solid oxide fuel cells to thermoelectrics. Its scope is practical and device-oriented. Reviewers care about electrochemical performance data, cycling stability, and real device metrics. Purely computational or theoretical work has a harder time here.

Publication volume is high at 2,000+ articles per year. Average time from submission to first decision runs 30-50 days. Total publication timeline is typically 3-5 months.

JPS vs. JPS Advances. Elsevier launched Journal of Power Sources Advances as a gold OA companion journal. It covers the same scope but with a newer, smaller track record. APCs are lower, and it provides an alternative within the Elsevier ecosystem if JPS rejects your paper.

DOE funding is particularly relevant for battery and fuel cell research. The Department of Energy requires public access through DOE PAGES or the OSTI repository. JPS's subscription track plus OSTI deposit satisfies this requirement at no cost.

For Plan S, select CC BY specifically during the production workflow. Elsevier's default for some journals is CC BY-NC-ND, which won't satisfy cOAlition S funders.

• No submission fees. You only face costs if your paper is accepted and you choose OA.
• No color charges. Online figures are always in color at no cost.
• Supplementary data is hosted free on ScienceDirect or Mendeley Data.
• VAT applies for European authors, potentially adding 15-25% to the APC.
• Currency note. Elsevier lists APCs in EUR and GBP alongside USD. The exchange rate at invoicing determines your cost if paying in a different currency.
• Green OA embargo is 12 months. You can deposit the accepted manuscript (pre-typesetting) in an institutional or funder repository after that period.
• Reprints cost extra for physical copies, though almost nobody orders them anymore.

JPS reviewers focus on a few specific things that newer energy storage journals may not emphasize as heavily:

Device-level data. JPS strongly prefers papers with real device performance, not just materials synthesis and basic characterization. If you're studying a battery electrode material, reviewers want full cell data, cycling stability over hundreds of cycles, and rate capability tests.

Electrochemical rigor. Impedance spectroscopy, cyclic voltammetry, and galvanostatic cycling should follow established best practices. Sloppy electrode preparation or incomplete electrochemical characterization is a common reason for rejection.

Practical relevance. JPS is more engineering-oriented than chemistry-oriented. Reviewers ask "does this work in a real device?" more often than "is the chemistry novel?"

1. Institution has an Elsevier R&P deal? Choose OA. It's free, and your paper gets maximum visibility.
2. DOE-funded work? The subscription track plus OSTI deposit satisfies DOE requirements at $0 cost. OA is optional.
3. Budget is limited, no institutional deal? Publish via the subscription track for free. ScienceDirect subscriptions are near-universal at battery research institutions.
4. Work is top-tier? Consider Energy Storage Materials (same Elsevier R&P coverage, similar APC, IF ~18) or ACS Energy Letters (IF ~20) if your results justify a more selective venue.

Before submitting, ensure your electrochemical data, cycling protocols, and device metrics are presented to JPS's standards. Incomplete characterization is the most common path to rejection. Run a free readiness scan to check your manuscript against the issues that lead to desk rejection at energy storage journals.

For more on how impact factors shape publication strategy, see our detailed guide.