Posted on 05/11/2021 9:47:12 AM PDT by Red Badger
I produce a high volume of heated compressed air. I must be valuable.
A magnetic levitation device in vacuum can store electrical input as a mass in motion. The linear drive motor to set the mass in motion doubles as a generator in deceleration mode. The losses to magnetic drag from induced eddy currents is minimized with application of actively-controlled attractive levitation. The engineering calculations suggest one-percent loss per week in stand-by. Energy input and extraction for large storage systems should exhibit 99% efficiency.
To build a case for “renewables” the energy-related big tech mob promoted a companion need for very complex grid systems as required to make the grid “stable” and what the whole really does is make the grid less stable. But hey, the big tech outfits got to sell a lot of big technology for their schemes that have never fulfilled the sales job put out for them.
Rather than vent the heat generated as the air is compressed, Hydrostor’s system captures that heat and stores it in a separate thermal storage tank, then uses it to reheat the air as it’s fed in to the turbine stage, which increases the efficiency of the system.
Back in the 70s when I worked on earthmovers, I visited Bath County Virginia where they were building a pumped storage project. Apparently it’s still active:
http://www.virginiaplaces.org/energy/bathpumped.html
You are describing flywheel energy storage.
We worked on that for hybrid vehicle energy storage.
Vacuum seals that last for years on rotating shafts is a tough one to do economically.
Battery electric seems to be the winner right now.
I had a team that worked on flywheel energy storage. Those were tough problems. I think the best we ever did was make compact units the could go underground (for safety) to power traffic lights through occasional power outages. I’ve been out of that business for a bit over 20 years now.
If demand exceeds supply you don't loose electricity, some sectors go without, i.e rolling blackouts/brownouts, just like in third world countries or California. If supply exceeds demand, you can "store"the excess in pumped storage hydro, compressed air storage in rock formations or chemically in batteries. Pumped storage hydro is the most developed and is inuse in some parts of the country, it is relatively efficient but requires the ability to have a pumped storage reservoir near grid connections. Compressed air storage has some of the same limitations as pumped storage hydro, requiring large hollow rock formations to store the compressed air. Also compressing air will always be less efficient than pumping water. Battery storage units can be placed anywhere, can be quite efficient, but require toxic and expensive materials to manufacture and must be disposed of as toxic waste at the end of (a short) useful life.
In California especially, surplus electric is becoming a thing of the past. In short, compressed air storage has some utility (no pun intended) but will not be the panacea envisioned by the article.
Pfff..... I proposed that project to a mining company 30 years ago. They had an abandoned deep mine in hard rock not that far away from where they were currently mining and were looking to take advantage of cheaper nighttime rates and load levelling during the day. In the end as is often the case, it just became too hard a sell to upper management...too bad, it would have worked quite well. As for the economics….we never got to completing the feasibility study stage.
Pumped storage hydro is the most developed and is inuse in some parts of the country, it is relatively efficient but requires the ability to have a pumped storage reservoir near grid connections.
There is a YouTube titled something like the “largest battery in Britain” that shows pretty much how it works. Pump the water up the hill at night when demand is low and generate electricity during the day when demand is up. I would imagine environmentalists would be dead set against it...
It’s still a double-conversion, which means it’s inherently inefficient. It doesn’t matter whether it’s electricity or compressed air, they’re still converting energy into a storeable form, and then converting it again into something that can be used to produce force.
But in the case of fossil fuels, nature already has done the converting and storing for us. Sunshine was converted into stable petrochemical energy. You can put it in your pocket and take it wherever you need to use it. Then light a match to it to release the energy. None of these crazy schemes can or will come close to that kind of low cost and efficiency.
There are a couple of hydro pumped storage setups here in GA. They’ve been in place a long time.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocky_Mountain_Hydroelectric_Plant
One company I have invested in, and have been working with for the past 3 years has a green process of extracting Lithium from Brine or Clay. It doesn’t require heat, and all reagents are recycled and reused in a circular manner
We can process lithium rich Brine and extract the Lithium in under 4 hours instead of the 18-24 months the competition requires. The processed Brine is then pumped back into the shallow end of the Brine reservoir.
The present plan is to launch the company with the intent of reclaiming all valuable minerals from spent Lithium batteries, by reverse assembly and extraction of each element in a unique process. Again, no heat and all reagents are continuously reused.
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