In the late 1980’s a number of companies were attempting to commercialize rechargeable lithium metal batteries. Unfortunately these batteries were plagued by safety problems associated with the stripping and plating of lithium metal in liquid electrolytes. This was followed in 1991 by the highly successful commercial launch of Li-ion batteries by Sony. Although Li-ion battery technology has seen steady incremental improvements since that time, the market demand for a disruptive battery technology is undeniable. Accordingly, over the past few decades there have been significant investments in R&D targeted at next generation batteries. In this presentation we will address strategies for realizing this goal through introduction of reversible lithium metal electrodes.