Gravity Batteries for energy storage

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BigBarney
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Post by BigBarney » Tue. Apr. 25, 2023 12:33 pm

Here they come cheaper energy storage... Useable anywhere...

https://interestingengineering.com/innovation/two ... -and-china

https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/energy/a ... batteries/

This is a way to store energy that is excess for the time when needed

and do it cheaply.I even think that you could store heat in the bricks

to be able to supply heat for processes and DHW , and heat buildings

with the same blocks of material.

This will replace a lot of fossil fuel and is earth friendly.

BigBarney

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Richard S.
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Post by Richard S. » Tue. Apr. 25, 2023 1:29 pm

Storage systems can be applied to any source of energy, in fact it's much more applicable to fossil fuel plants because you only need a small amount of it. The lowest cost power is from baseload fossil fuel plants. Storage can be used to eliminate the need for less efficient intermediary and peaking plants. Less plants to build/maintain and the ones you are operating are running at peak efficiency. The storage system capacity is relatively small because it only needs to meet peak demand in 24 hour period.

It's 0 degrees out in the Northeast US, no wind and cloudy.... it's going to be like that for the next week. How much capacity and storage do you think would be required to gather power the preceding week(s) to meet those demands? Both the capacity and storage requirements balloon to enormous amounts to meet that demand.

While storage has the potential to decrease the cost of conventional energy sources it's only going to increase the cost of renewable sources. Enormous costs for both capacity and storage if you were try to meet your demands with renewable alone.

 
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Post by nut » Tue. Apr. 25, 2023 9:28 pm

It boils down to whether you believe the burning of fossil fuels is contributing to climate change. If you do then it's not about the cost to produce or store renewable sources. It's about the overall costs to not switch. Extreme weather events. food production and droughts, rising sea levels, melting ice caps and mass migrations. If you don't believe it then it is only about initial costs. I don't see the burning of fossil fuels going completely away any time soon. I do see it diminishing. After all, it is 200,000 + year old technology.


 
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warminmn
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Post by warminmn » Tue. Apr. 25, 2023 9:53 pm

The first link locked up my computer... so I didnt finish the article.

Just what I want to look at. A 400 foot tall large building. Its bad enough looking at windmills. Just another stupid senseless impractical idea. So Im sure someone will make money with it.

 
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Richard S.
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Post by Richard S. » Wed. Apr. 26, 2023 12:51 am

warminmn wrote:
Tue. Apr. 25, 2023 9:53 pm
Just what I want to look at. A 400 foot tall large building. Its bad enough looking at windmills. Just another stupid senseless impractical idea. So Im sure someone will make money with it.
Being able to store energy cheaply no matter what the technology producing it is a pretty big deal. The biggest inefficiency in the grid is the up and down demands put on it, this issue is compounded further with intermittent renewable energy production which can have wild fluctuations with certain weather conditions. The storage acts as a buffer between production and demand.

Whether the cost of storage can offset the capital investment into building excessive capacity remains to be seen.

This isn't a unique idea or anything that is new. A basic idea is you pump water uphill and use that to produce power when demand is high. One big issue with any gravity storage system is it introduces inefficiencies itself.

 
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Post by Richard S. » Wed. Apr. 26, 2023 1:34 am

nut wrote:
Tue. Apr. 25, 2023 9:28 pm
If you don't believe it then it is only about initial costs.
Whether you believe it or not the costs are extraordinary. Germany has enough renewable resources to power their grid under ideal weather conditions, the issue is they still have have to maintain conventional sources for reliability. Germany also has one the highest electric rates in the world, somewhere around 35 cents a kWh last I looked. They have a tax on power just to support the renewable energy sector, that tax itself exceeds some of the lowest retail rates here in the US.

Another reason for such a high rate is the capital investment in their conventional plants is not being fully utilized. One very important thing to keep in mind is as power production from renewable energy increases the cost per kWh increases from conventional power plant because of that underutilization. This increased cost can be directly attributed to renewable energy because the conventional plants are required for reliability. It's an expense that is never associated with renewable energy but should be.

To replace that reliability is no small matter. Your capacity and storage requirements grow to enormous amounts.

Suppose you have enough capacity to power the grid with renewable sources for 8 hours with ideal weather conditions. You still have the rest of the day/night so perhaps your capacity requirements just doubled for one day. You also need enough storage for it. If the weather is not ideal the next day your capacity/storage requirements are now 4X. If the weather is bad for a week? Is their some weird weather event that is going to last 2 weeks? It's really not possible to fully replace the reliability of conventional plants.

Conventional power is not 100% reliable but currently it's as close as you are going to get. You are not relying on the whims of Mother Nature. It's something that can be planned out with some certainty. You can stockpile coal next to a power plant to the moon if you want.

With all that said I'll offer the opinion that wind and solar technologies will be just a blip on the timeline and looked at as expensive boondoggles in the future. Fusion tech is where it's going to be. On the timeline of the history of man it will be the single biggest milestone. It's an absolute game changing technology.


 
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Post by Rob R. » Wed. Apr. 26, 2023 6:24 am

Richard S. wrote:
Wed. Apr. 26, 2023 12:51 am
This isn't a unique idea or anything that is new. A basic idea is you pump water uphill and use that to produce power when demand is high. One big issue with any gravity storage system is it introduces inefficiencies itself.
The Niagra Power Plant operated by the New York Power Authority includes pumped storage. See paragraph titled "Lewiston Pump-Generating Plant". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Moses_Niagar ... ower_Plant

While browsing the NYPA website I noticed they mentioned onsite solar storage as well.

https://services.nypa.gov/services/solar-storage/ ... S41My4wLjA.

 
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Post by nut » Wed. Apr. 26, 2023 10:06 am

Kind of related, Toyota's hydrogen power truck engine
https://www.autoblog.com/2023/04/26/toyota-hydrog ... alifornia/

 
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Post by BigBarney » Sat. Aug. 05, 2023 3:34 pm

Two of the larger gravity projects are near done and ready to commission...

The energy put in will be excess at times to balance supply/demand...

This energy is usually wasted with no place to go due to demand or

congestion on the grid,which is use it or lose it...

https://interestingengineering.com/innovation/two ... -and-china

Nothing wrong with the buildings, just like car parking garages...

The Robert Moses power plant and resevoir were the largest hydroelectric

plant in the world when constructed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Moses_Niagar ... ower_Plant

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sir_Adam_Beck_Hydro ... g_Stations

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niagara_Tunnel_Project

Canada has a similar power plant and also has a resevoir to store water.

The US during night hours takes 600,000 gallon/second of water out to the

resevoir,That is about 1/2 the flow .

They have tours of both the power plant and tunnels..

https://www.niagaraparks.com/visit/attractions/ni ... gara-falls

https://www.niagaraparks.com/visit/attractions/ni ... er-station

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Post by davidmcbeth3 » Sat. Aug. 05, 2023 4:56 pm

BigBarney wrote:
Tue. Apr. 25, 2023 12:33 pm


This will replace a lot of fossil fuel and is earth friendly.

BigBarney

BigBarney
Once can argue that burning fossil fuels is re-cycling. I love to re-cycle. :idea:

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