Green energy storage

Impetus

There are numerous ways to store energy, but each has its limitations. Eg pumped water - the limitations are the availability of suitable sites, and the need to keep the pumped storage platform running virtually 365/365 to make it economic. One might get a long windy period (as Ireland is experiencing at present) and long periods of calm.

Updating hydro-electric dams

Conventional hydro-electric dams can be upgraded by installing additional generators, enabling the same river to produce more power in times of peak demand, at a low investment cost. Most of the infrastructure is already well paid for, and there is no uphill pumping cost. It also helps reduce the risk of flooding, because one can dump larger amounts of water faster at low tide just before heavy rainfall is forecast, and still create energy in the process.

Electronysis

PEM (proton exchange membrane) electrolysis can store multiple GWh of power for weeks on end at an efficiency ratio of about 70%. The start-up time is less than 10 sec from standby mode, or 10 minutes from cold start - making it far more responsive than a conventional power generation source.

The system uses water (700 m3 of water can create enough hydrogen (H2) to store 4 GWh of electricity). This is the water consumption of about 5 households every year. The energy produced (H2) is stored in tanks and converted back into electricity by fuel cells. The H2 can also be used to fuel hydrogen powered public and private transport and for industrial purposes. Energy parks are starting to spring up in Germany located in close proximity to heavy grid capacity, to perform this storage. There is no raw material cost for wind or solar energy, so the real lifetime cost per kWh generated leaves more than enough margin to pay for this type of energy storage technology to be put in place. The only limit on storage time or quantity of hydrogen is the tank capacity. The land space required for this technology is far smaller than that required for pumped storage and similar.

http://www.industry.siemens.com/topics/global/en/pem-electrolyzer/silyzer/Pages/silyzer.aspx

International Grid connectivity

This offers virtual electricity storage, by selling surplus power when generated to other countries, and importing power when needed. Wind and sun amounts vary by geographic region and at different times of the year. Even nuclear power varies - eg in France in 2003 virtually all the nuclear power plants had to be powered down due to the shortage of water in the rivers, and the country had to rely on importing electricity from neighbouring countries to keep the lights on and the air conditioning running in the soaring heat. Meanwhile Germany and Spain had large solar voltaic farms running at high efficiency in the same sunshine to supplement their conventional power production systems. The EU produces more power from solar farms than anywhere else - lead by Germany, Italy, and Spain (EU total 68 GWp -v- USA and China have about 8 GWp each).

There is an interesting blog/discussion covering the green energy storage topic at the moment in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (DE) newspaper website.

http://live.faz.net/Event/Energiespeicher?Page=0

nokia69

Electronysis is a very bad way to store power

batteries are far better, Tesla motors will start selling home battery systems for solar PV systems, but they could also be used for storing electricty at off peak times and using it later when the grid is under pressure

Impetus

nokia69 wrote: »

Electronysis is a very bad way to store power

batteries are far better, Tesla motors will start selling home battery systems for solar PV systems, but they could also be used for storing electricty at off peak times and using it later when the grid is under pressure

Why are batteries far better (than hydrogen / electrolysis)? I agree that batteries, in due course, when there is a national user base of electric cars, fitted with batteries that are good for perhaps a 100,000 cycles, combined with smart metering, offer grid storage potential. Perhaps capacitors will take over this role? Fewer pylons and 400kV lines, etc.

However hydrogen produced from water at the moment is far more sustainable, assuming it is created by electrolysis of renewable power. It allows one to add to storage capacity by increasing the size of the H2 tank farm. The components of H2 storage are far less polluting than the raw materials used in modern battery production. You can locate H2 energy parks near high capacity grid locations, reducing the number and size of grid connections required to deliver an interruption-free supply.

nokia69

Impetus wrote: »

Why are batteries far better (than hydrogen / electrolysis)? I agree that batteries, in due course, when there is a national user base of electric cars, fitted with batteries that are good for perhaps a 100,000 cycles, combined with smart metering, offer grid storage potential. Perhaps capacitors will take over this role? Fewer pylons and 400kV lines, etc.

However hydrogen produced from water at the moment is far more sustainable, assuming it is created by electrolysis of renewable power. It allows one to add to storage capacity by increasing the size of the H2 tank farm. The components of H2 storage are far less polluting than the raw materials used in modern battery production. You can locate H2 energy parks near high capacity grid locations, reducing the number and size of grid connections required to deliver an interruption-free supply.

because you lose a far bigger % of the electricty you are storing, with a battery you could get over 90% back with hydrogen you will have far more waste

also I could see millions of people using batteries to store power at home, I don't see the same happening with hydrogen

http://www.forbes.com/sites/uciliawang/2013/12/05/solarcity-next-move-bundling-teslas-batteries-with-solar/

Impetus

nokia69 wrote: »

because you lose a far bigger % of the electricty you are storing, with a battery you could get over 90% back with hydrogen you will have far more waste

also I could see millions of people using batteries to store power at home, I don't see the same happening with hydrogen

http://www.forbes.com/sites/uciliawang/2013/12/05/solarcity-next-move-bundling-teslas-batteries-with-solar/

This is a power backup using batteries for households who have PV solar. http://www.solarcity.com/residential/energy-storage.aspx

These batteries typically have a 500 cycle life - ie full charge and discharge.

They would not be suitable for grid storage given this limitation. Not to mention their limited capacity in terms of MWh. At best this technology is designed for people whose homes are off-grid, and need to be able to turn the lights on after sundown.

http://www.solarcity.com/residential/energy-storage.aspx

nokia69

Impetus wrote: »

This is a power backup using batteries for households who have PV solar. http://www.solarcity.com/residential/energy-storage.aspx

These batteries typically have a 500 cycle life - ie full charge and discharge.

They would not be suitable for grid storage given this limitation. Not to mention their limited capacity in terms of MWh. At best this technology is designed for people whose homes are off-grid, and need to be able to turn the lights on after sundown.

http://www.solarcity.com/residential/energy-storage.aspx

right now they are mainly used with off grid solar systems but if you read the quote below they have other uses

An additional benefit of energy storage is to reduce peak-usage charges on your utility bill. Some utilities offer Time-of-Use (TOU) rate plans in which the price of electricity varies based on the hour of the day. Rates are higher during the afternoon when electric demand is at its "peak" across all utility customers.
A storage system may help you save more money by drawing power from your battery instead of from the grid during higher rates peak hours. You can then recharge your battery during lower rate, off-peak hours.

also a pack like this would not be 100% charged or discharged, it would be kept between 20% and 80% to extend the life of the battery

we WILL see batteries used as grid storage its only a matter of time

Impetus

nokia69 wrote: »

right now they are mainly used with off grid solar systems but if you read the quote below they have other uses



also a pack like this would not be 100% charged or discharged, it would be kept between 20% and 80% to extend the life of the battery

we WILL see batteries used as grid storage its only a matter of time

The other application you refer to is peaking, which is probably heavier on batteries than switching a few lights on in a house after dark.

It is a big if, but if you got twice as many cycles by operating within the 20-80% range, I doubt if you would approach 1000 cycles equivalent.

We will need to see a dramatic increase in the cycle life of batteries, together with a massive elimination of toxic / rare earth substances in batteries before we see them taking over from industrial sized storage systems, on an economic, sustainable basis.

nokia69

Impetus wrote: »

This is a power backup using batteries for households who have PV solar. http://www.solarcity.com/residential/energy-storage.aspx

These batteries typically have a 500 cycle life - ie full charge and discharge.

They would not be suitable for grid storage given this limitation. Not to mention their limited capacity in terms of MWh. At best this technology is designed for people whose homes are off-grid, and need to be able to turn the lights on after sundown.

http://www.solarcity.com/residential/energy-storage.aspx

Impetus wrote: »

The other application you refer to is peaking, which is probably heavier on batteries than switching a few lights on in a house after dark.

It is a big if, but if you got twice as many cycles by operating within the 20-80% range, I doubt if you would approach 1000 cycles equivalent.

We will need to see a dramatic increase in the cycle life of batteries, together with a massive elimination of toxic / rare earth substances in batteries before we see them taking over from industrial sized storage systems, on an economic, sustainable basis.

your information on batteries is out of date

Impetus

nokia69 wrote: »

your information on batteries is out of date

Evidence that my information is out of date please?

I sincerely wish it was out of date, and rechargeable batteries did not contain polluting rare metals and did last forever and a day with no drop in the charging capacity.

I suspect that most people subscribed to this would like to find a source - even if only for their mobile phone and/or notebook PC etc.....

nokia69

Impetus wrote: »

Evidence that my information is out of date please?

I sincerely wish it was out of date, and rechargeable batteries did not contain polluting rare metals and did last forever and a day with no drop in the charging capacity.

I suspect that most people subscribed to this would like to find a source - even if only for their mobile phone and/or notebook PC etc.....

watch the video above, the reason mobile phone and PC batteries are piss poor is because of temperature and not staying between 20% to 80%

someone who bought a Tesla model S watched the video above and sent an email to the professor asking how long will his model S battery last for

QUESTION Debate continues on whether charging habits will turn out to have much effect on battery life. I have started leaving all of my li-ion consumer products at about 50% charge when they are not in use. Tesla makes this very easy with a battery slider that allows the consumer to choose between 50% and 100% end charging and even has this feature integrated into the phone app to make it very easy to adjust upwards on the fly as long as the car is plugged in. I have installed an 80A (20 kWh) charger so that I can quickly add charge to the Tesla S, allowing me to minimize the inconveniences associated with leaving the pack at a low state of charge and thus increasing the amount of time the battery stays at a mid/low SOC. I tend to do mid pack cycling, discharging generally between 30 and 70% when convenient, while aiming to have the car sit for the longer stretches like overnight, at 50%. I'm not religious about this, just tend to aim in this direction generally.

REPLY --

I THINK THAT IF YOU ARE KEEPING THE CELLS BELOW 4.0V (NO WAY FOR YOU TO TELL THAT, HOWEVER) THE BATTERY LIFE WILL BE VERY IMPRESSIVE. WE ARE TESTING CELLS BUILT IN 2002 THAT HAVE 2002 TECHNOLOGY (LIFETIME IS BETTER NOW) THAT STILL HAVE 75% OF THEIR INITIAL CAPACITY (CYLCED AT 37c THE WHOLE TIME). THESE CELLS WERE CHARGED ONLY TO 4.075V. MODERN CELLS LIKE THOSE IN TESLA CHARGED TO 4.0V SHOULD LAST A FEW DECADES, I SUSPECT, WITHOUT ANY ISSUE (SO KEEP YOUR CAR FROM RUSTING!). WHERE IS 4.0V RELATIVE TO STATE OF CHARGE? MAYBE 75%.

you don't need to watch all of the video above but go to the 1 hour 8 min mark and he talks about cycle life and recycling

now of course you could claim that by keeping the battery between 20 to 80% of charge that this is not a full charge cycle, but since we know that doing full 0 to 100% cycles is one of the things that kills the battery then this should be avoided as much as possible

also Tesla are selling over 500 cars a week and there are over 100K electric cars in the US is this not a form of green energy storage, the energy does not get returned to the grid but that might change in the future

Impetus

nokia69 wrote: »

Thank you for the video link which I shall look at when I have some spare time – it is over an hour long. I would draw your attention to a view expressed by DR. Jörg ROTHERMEL in the expert discussion I linked to at the root posting of this. (Germany is one of the largest renewable energy countries in the world with massive amounts of solar, wind and hydro electric power experience under its belt, and without doubt the finest engineering expertise on the planet).

Basically battery energy storage, while it is useful, is not enough in the scheme of things. One can go for days or even weeks with very little wind energy especially in Summer. Even if every car was electric, and all vehicles connected with two way grid connections, as well as the battery storage option you linked to yesterday, it would not be enough to deliver anything like the 5 GW/h that Ireland needs at peak times, day in day out during a low wind month. You also have to have enough power in reserve in the cars to perform as cars!

The only solutions to this energy trough under current technology is either substantial amounts of international grid connectivity, tanks of H2 stored in an energy park, or massive amounts of pumped storage (a la Norway or Switzerland). Preferably a mixture of them all, having regard to the fact that they must get regular use to be economically viable as energy storage options in themselves. I do agree that batteries will improve and if properly managed will have a useful contribution to make.

Quote from Frankfurter Allgemeine :

7 Februar 14:05 DR. JÖRG ROTHERMEL
Das reicht leider nicht aus. Das Problem ist, dass wir Wind- und Solarstrom nicht dann und nicht dort produzieren können wo er gerade gebraucht wird. Das können wir zwar etwas ausgleichen mit zusätzlichem Netzausbau, um den Strom dorthin zu transportieren wo er benötigt wird. Zudem haben wir heute schon soviel Erzeugungskapazität an Photovoltaik und Wind wie wir maximal benötigen. Alles was wir jetzt noch hinzubauen ist "Stromüberschuss" den wir sinnvollerweise speichern sollten.

http://live.faz.net/Event/Energiespeicher?Page=0

Impetus

I am watching your video at the moment. He is citing a well to wheel efficiency of Hydrogen based on it being made from natural gas. The Siemens technology is far more efficient in that it uses green energy to break down water and create the hydrogen gas.

Natural gas to H2 is not renewable, and in the US will involve a lot of fracing (not fracking as the Americans and GB's spell it). It derives from hydraulic fracturing of rock. It is not a very environmentally clean way to get gas. See the Gasland movie - this is only a trailer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZe1AeH0Qz8

nokia69

Impetus wrote: »

I am watching your video at the moment. He is citing a well to wheel efficiency of Hydrogen based on it being made from natural gas. The Siemens technology is far more efficient in that it uses green energy to break down water and create the hydrogen gas.

Natural gas to H2 is not renewable, and in the US will involve a lot of fracing (not fracking as the Americans and GB's spell it). It derives from hydraulic fracturing of rock. It is not a very environmentally clean way to get gas. See the Gasland movie - this is only a trailer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZe1AeH0Qz8

STOP

if you think that hydrogen produced by any source is the solution to anything then you DON'T understand the problem

forget hydrogen, at best its the punch line to a joke at worst its a scam

hydrogen is a bad joke and will NEVER be used on a large scale

Markcheese

Why would you take natural gas turn it into hydrogen and then stick it in a fuel cell .
Pretty sure I've seen something about natural gas fueled fuel cells ...

Impetus

nokia69 wrote: »

STOP

if you think that hydrogen produced by any source is the solution to anything then you DON'T understand the problem

forget hydrogen, at best its the punch line to a joke at worst its a scam

hydrogen is a bad joke and will NEVER be used on a large scale

Why please? You post extreme statements without any credible backup for your assertions. I would love to know why H2 is a "scam"....

Impetus

Markcheese wrote: »

Why would you take natural gas turn it into hydrogen and then stick it in a fuel cell .
Pretty sure I've seen something about natural gas fueled fuel cells ...

creating H2 from gas is loaded with energy conversion losses at every turn.

It needs to originate from green energy, because this has the largest profit margin (which covers the 20% odd conversion loss). And green energy needs H2 to fill in the supply gaps.

Impetus

nokia69 wrote: »

also Tesla are selling over 500 cars a week and there are over 100K electric cars in the US is this not a form of green energy storage, the energy does not get returned to the grid but that might change in the future

This video has very little to do with grid scale energy storage. It is a Stanford U history lesson on the Tesla, aimed at 20 something freshmen.

The only element that the movie suggests which is consistent with your postings is that if a battery is kept within the 20/80% min / max charge it will have a lot more cycles. Even that is not properly supported by evidence, while I do not doubt same - the only issue is the added number of cycles.

You have to keep in mind that even if there were a million electric cars in Ireland, each of which had say 30 MW of "surplus" electricity storage on average, it would only offer cover for about a week. Which while it is a help, is not enough. Also the motorist has to keep in mind his/her own energy budget for their planned driving, and this has to be kept within the 20/80% load range.

nokia69

Impetus wrote: »

This video has very little to do with grid scale energy storage. It is a Stanford U history lesson on the Tesla, aimed at 20 something freshmen.

The only element that the movie suggests which is consistent with your postings is that if a battery is kept within the 20/80% min / max charge it will have a lot more cycles. Even that is not properly supported by evidence, while I do not doubt same - the only issue is the added number of cycles.

You have to keep in mind that even if there were a million electric cars in Ireland, each of which had say 30 MW of "surplus" electricity storage on average, it would only offer cover for about a week. Which while it is a help, is not enough. Also the motorist has to keep in mind his/her own energy budget for their planned driving, and this has to be kept within the 20/80% load range.

I NEVER said the video was about grid storage, I just said you were wrong about how long batteries could last for, you asked for the evidence so I gave you the video

where is all this excess green energy that you want to store, the grid does work better if you have a cheep way to store energy but I'm not sure why you need to store months worth of electricty, all you need to do is be able to store power to help deal with peak demand

we will see large numbers of people with batteries in their homes charged at night and then used during the peak hours, this will start to happen by the end of the year

I doubt we will ever see a large hydrogen storage system

Impetus

nokia69 wrote: »

I NEVER said the video was about grid storage, I just said you were wrong about how long batteries could last for, you asked for the evidence so I gave you the video

where is all this excess green energy that you want to store, the grid does work better if you have a cheep way to store energy but I'm not sure why you need to store months worth of electricty, all you need to do is be able to store power to help deal with peak demand

we will see large numbers of people with batteries in their homes charged at night and then used during the peak hours, this will start to happen by the end of the year

I doubt we will ever see a large hydrogen storage system

Green energy storage is the topic here. While electric car batteries will have a role, the scope is a lot wider. Again you make a sweeping statement "I doubt we will ever see a large hydrogen storage system" with no scientific evidence to backup your assertion.

nokia69

Impetus wrote: »

Green energy storage is the topic here. While electric car batteries will have a role, the scope is a lot wider. Again you make a sweeping statement "I doubt we will ever see a large hydrogen storage system" with no scientific evidence to backup your assertion.

you admit already in the thread that producing hydrogen is not efficient

do you also know how difficult and dangerous it is to store hydrogen

there is plenty of scientific evidence to back up all my claims

Impetus

nokia69 wrote: »

you admit already in the thread that producing hydrogen is not efficient

do you also know how difficult and dangerous it is to store hydrogen

there is plenty of scientific evidence to back up all my claims

I did not - I only said that H2 from nat gas is inefficient.

It is not difficult or dangerous to store H2 in land based tank farms. Please don't confuse the issue with H2 in cars.

In any event researchers have reached an advanced stage in the use of ammonia in hydrogen storage to reduce the mass of the stored object. More here:

http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=hydrogen+storage+ammonia&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart&sa=X&ei=N38CU-3TCsmd7gbYm4F4&ved=0CCUQgQMwAA

nokia69

Impetus wrote: »

Green energy storage is the topic here. While electric car batteries will have a role, the scope is a lot wider. Again you make a sweeping statement "I doubt we will ever see a large hydrogen storage system" with no scientific evidence to backup your assertion.

Impetus wrote: »

I did not - I only said that H2 from nat gas is inefficient.

It is not difficult or dangerous to store H2 in land based tank farms. Please don't confuse the issue with H2 in cars.

In any event researchers have reached an advanced stage in the use of ammonia in hydrogen storage to reduce the mass of the stored object. More here:

http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=hydrogen+storage+ammonia&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart&sa=X&ei=N38CU-3TCsmd7gbYm4F4&ved=0CCUQgQMwAA

producing hydrogen from water is even worse than producing it from natural gas

its never going to happen

if you had a wind farm producing electricty why would you want to waste so much power producing hydrogen, if you make money selling electricty you don't want to waste any

Impetus

nokia69 wrote: »

producing hydrogen from water is even worse than producing it from natural gas

its never going to happen

if you had a wind farm producing electricty why would you want to waste so much power producing hydrogen, if you make money selling electricty you don't want to waste any

This thread is posted based on a large upscale of the wind energy generation system - ie where Ireland has far more energy production capacity than it needs. The objective is to go some way towards eliminating the 6€billion a year spent on imported energy and turning it into energy exports instead.

Even if Ireland did not achieve large scale exports in the short/medium term, the price of energy varies enormously based on time of day. eg from €34 to €225 per MWh - see http://www.sem-o.com/Pages/default.aspx

There is a huge margin in the equation for anyone storing energy generated offpeak when they could only sell it for 3.5 c per kWh - if they instead released it into the market at 22.5c per kWh using storage.

nokia69

I know all that

so why do you want to store energy for weeks or months when the price swings happen every day

Markcheese

the main limiting factor on all green energy storage is the cost..

Even if battery technology becomes fantastic,or someone is dumb enough to build huge pumped storage to back up wind turbines ect ect, it won't come close to being as cheap as natural gas in existing power plants... (as a backup to wind)
No matter how many wind turbines we have we're pretty much going to need our peak electricity demand backed up
by gas...
And if new tech comes on stream to provide low price alternatives to gas it'll drive down the cost of gas and of gas produced power-
Because that infrastructure is built and the money spent...

Macha

Markcheese wrote: »

the main limiting factor on all green energy storage is the cost..

Even if battery technology becomes fantastic,or someone is dumb enough to build huge pumped storage to back up wind turbines ect ect, it won't come close to being as cheap as natural gas in existing power plants... (as a backup to wind)
No matter how many wind turbines we have we're pretty much going to need our peak electricity demand backed up
by gas...
And if new tech comes on stream to provide low price alternatives to gas it'll drive down the cost of gas and of gas produced power-
Because that infrastructure is built and the money spent...

This is not accurate. The are plenty of other technical options, including interconnection, demand side management, some curtailment and yes, some peaking plants. These technologies should all be able to compete in a fully functional balancing market that is, ideally, a regional one that identifies the potential options wider than just within national borders.

There is no guarantee that wholesale gas prices will go down in the future and every indication they will rise as conventional sources dry up and carbon pricing comes into effect, encouraging a switch from coal to gas across Europe.

Markcheese

My point wasn't knocking use management or even interconnectors but if we have a wind turbine based electricity generation system we're going to need a stored energy system to back it up (wether it's gas,biomas,batteries,hydrogen what ever).. Doesn't matter if we have 4 times or 5 or 10 times our daily power usage in wind turbines ... It's useless if the wind doesnt blow for a week... And if it's
going to come through Interconnecters, then it's still got to come from somewhere ....
As to the gas price even if the price goes through the roof , the gas component is a small component of the overall cost of keeping stations available to back up periods of slack wind...
Most Irish power stations run on gas,most have at least 15 to 20 years life left in them before major refits are needed,probably a lot more if the gas price goes so high as to make wind our main power source...


Where's it going to come for

Macha

Markcheese wrote: »

My point wasn't knocking use management or even interconnectors but if we have a wind turbine based electricity generation system we're going to need a stored energy system to back it up (wether it's gas,biomas,batteries,hydrogen what ever).. Doesn't matter if we have 4 times or 5 or 10 times our daily power usage in wind turbines ... It's useless if the wind doesnt blow for a week... And if it's
going to come through Interconnecters, then it's still got to come from somewhere ....

No, we don't need a a stored energy system to back it up - that's exactly my point - we need a balancing market where lots of technologies, including storage, can compete to provide those balancing services. In terms of balancing, renewables can themselves provide key ancillary services to the electricity system like reactive power or fast reserve. And don't forget renewable installations can shut themselves down - nukes and coal plants can't. You can read more here: https://www.entsoe.eu/about-entso-e/market/balancing-and-ancillary-services-markets/

Markcheese wrote: »

As to the gas price even if the price goes through the roof , the gas component is a small component of the overall cost of keeping stations available to back up periods of slack wind...

See above.

Markcheese wrote: »

Most Irish power stations run on gas,most have at least 15 to 20 years life left in them before major refits are needed,probably a lot more if the gas price goes so high as to make wind our main power source...

Hah, you sure? You have any idea how disruptive PV is? Germany is at 22% share of renewables electricity and gas plants are already having to shut down, also of course because coal is so cheap.

Read this report to see how close PV already is to the LCOE of CCGT in Germany, or even below!: http://www.ise.fraunhofer.de/en/publications/veroeffentlichungen-pdf-dateien-en/studien-und-konzeptpapiere/study-levelized-cost-of-electricity-renewable-energies.pdf

Markcheese

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b042zsy5

BBC radio programme on energy storage about 20 minutes long,

The bit I found most interesting was adding up to 5% hydrogen to the gas grid as energy storage...

Stored hydrogen is the best solution for shipping and freight that I can see.

I don't get this "keep the lights on" campaign at all. Turn 'em off until you get it right, you'd be surprised how much more an incentive that is.

Markcheese

What d ya mean " keep the lights on "

It's a slogan brandished mostly by UK energy companies with loose association to switching to renewables but generally more emphasis in meeting an increased demand in face of a pending energy crisis.

Capt'n Midnight

Impetus wrote: »

PEM (proton exchange membrane) electrolysis can store multiple GWh of power for weeks on end at an efficiency ratio of about 70%. The start-up time is less than 10 sec from standby mode, or 10 minutes from cold start - making it far more responsive than a conventional power generation source.

or you could feed Hydrogen into the existing Combined Cycle Gas Turbines and get almost 60% efficiency for a tiny fraction of the capital cost.

PEM can be up to 100 times the cost of turbines and it would only be used intermittently so would never justify the expense. Also turbines have a good track record and are well understand and will run on natural gas, biogas and producer gas (biomass / waste to energy)

The other advantage of hydrogen is that when fed in to the gas mains it also replaces fossil fuel used for heating and cooking. The Dutch were looking at 20-25% hydrogen in mains.

nokia69

http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/Tesla-CTO-on-Energy-Storage-We-Should-All-Be-Thinking-Bigger

."
That was Straubel's response when asked why Tesla is involved in stationary energy storage. He said that residential battery packs have the "same architecture" as vehicle batteries.
He noted that since last year, a 2 megawatt-hour battery pack has been helping to manage loads at the Fremont Tesla factory, managing 10 percent of peak demand. "It's still a small pack," said Straubel. "The scale we need to operate on is so much bigger than that." The installation will be expanded to 4 megawatt-hours in the next three to four months.

No hydrogen needed

Batteries are made of heavy metals.

A forty ton truck doing 5 MPG is using ~45KW for that gallon. Say it needs a modest 400 mile range that's 3.6mW, add 30% battery capacity for longevity sake that's a 4.7mW battery. How much does that weigh? How much cargo space is lost?
Then of course if you want that truck tomorrow you'll need a charger the size of half a container crate and a grid to support it.
Scale up to a 400 meter long cargo ship...batteries simply can't cut it, in refueling time alone.

Hydrogen created from renewable overage to me sounds more viable and less harmful to produce.

[Edit]: figures on conversion of energy are based on the internal combustion engine, on a "DC" motor not requiring coolant () or an alternator could double that range for same if driving during the daytime.

nokia69

Sir Liamalot wrote: »

Batteries are made of heavy metals.

A forty ton truck doing 5 MPG is using ~45KW for that gallon. Say it needs a modest 400 mile range that's 3.6mW, add 30% battery capacity for longevity sake that's a 4.7mW battery. How much does that weigh? How much cargo space is lost?
Then of course if you want that truck tomorrow you'll need a charger the size of half a container crate and a grid to support it.
Scale up to a 400 meter long cargo ship...batteries simply can't cut it, in refueling time alone.

Hydrogen created from renewable overage to me sounds more viable and less harmful to produce.

what are you talking about

the thread is about green energy storage, not forty ton trucks

hydrogen is a joke and will never be used on a large scale for energy storage, or in cars or trucks for that matter

Hydrogen has stored energy much like petrol but burns clean.
Not all storage needs a positive and negative terminal.
The oceans are full of it...more so than lithium and easier to harvest.

nokia69

Sir Liamalot wrote: »

Hydrogen has stored energy much like petrol but burns clean.
Not all storage needs a positive and negative terminal.
The oceans are full of it...more so than lithium and easier to harvest.

I have no idea what this means

I doubt anyone does

If you burn hydrogen you get an exothermic reaction that can turn a turbine with steam in a stationary application or turn a cam from piston pressure in a combustion engine.
You can produce it from the oceans with electrolysis which takes a lot of energy but if that is from solar or wind that would otherwise be wasted then it's viable storage.
There's more hydrogen in the H²O of our oceans than lithium in our mines.
Hydrogen is already being used for storage. Toyota and GM are both developing hydrogen fueled cars.

nokia69

Sir Liamalot wrote: »

If you burn hydrogen you get an exothermic reaction that can turn a turbine with steam in a stationary application or turn a cam from piston pressure in a combustion engine.
You can produce it from the oceans with electrolysis which takes a lot of energy but if that is from solar or wind that would otherwise be wasted then it's viable storage.
There's more hydrogen in the H²O of our oceans than lithium in our mines.
Hydrogen is already being used for storage. Toyota and GM are both developing hydrogen fueled cars.

nope, never going to happen

If you ask Toyota or GM when will their fool cell cars go on sale, they will tell you in about 10 years

then ask them again in 2024, and the answer still be in about 10 years, fool cells are always 10 years away, and thats where they will stay

hydrogen will never be used on a large scale, its a scam

Capt'n Midnight

Sir Liamalot wrote: »

Hydrogen has stored energy much like petrol but burns clean.
Not all storage needs a positive and negative terminal.
The oceans are full of it...more so than lithium and easier to harvest.

nokia69 wrote: »

I have no idea what this means

I doubt anyone does

It means someone hasn't done their homework and is parroting badly researched stuff.


At present hydrogen made from fossil fuel is about the 1/4 the price of that made from renewables. So it's not economic.


It takes a lot of energy to store hydrogen whether you use pressure or cool the stuff. And then it's very, very difficult to keep stored. And then you have a very disappointingly energy density ( lightest gas / liquid known ) in a very heavy container.
So as an energy store it's a waste of energy.

Actually the best way to storing it ( price, energy density , ease of handling and storage) in a transportable form is as hydrocarbons, like LPG or petrol or Diesel

And if you have a leak ( hydrogen is the second leakiest thing known ) it's very, very explodeable.



Fuel cells are very, very expensive and aren't all that more efficient than the best gas turbine setups , and those are already in place and far more likely to be multi-fuel

That's what I get for believing what I read in forums I suppose, live and learn. It's not the most practical solution I'll grant you. I don't see a cleaner alternative for world cargo though.
I disagree with the no need for hydrogen statement. I'm not saying it's a game changer what I am saying is it has a place. I live on batteries have done for years and discounting a solution as less than ideal doesn't make progress.
I get spells of over-generation that I waste as heat or disconnect the generators because I've nowhere to put the electrons. The earlier BBC report told that companies were being paid to brake turbines. So hydrogen is a paltry < 50% return of input energy grand...better than 0%, no? If you can do better, do better.
I don't think hydrogen is a viable solution for my life, I'm looking at pumped storage and later possibly a thermal store for the seasonal drift. Simply continuing to add (lead acid) batteries to idle generators doesn't work, there comes a point when more batteries are deteriorating faster because they can't be maintained.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renewable_energy_in_Iceland
Middle of page for hydrogen related activity

Capt'n Midnight

Sir Liamalot wrote: »

That's what I get for believing what I read in forums I suppose, live and learn. It's not the most practical solution I'll grant you. I don't see a cleaner alternative for world cargo though.
I disagree with the no need for hydrogen statement

You have to use energy to make hydrogen. It's not an energy source.

And then there's all the storage problems.

You probably haven't heard of this one https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spin_isomers_of_hydrogen[QUOTE At room temperature, hydrogen contains 75% orthohydrogen, a proportion which the liquefaction process preserves if carried out in the absence of a catalyst like ferric oxide, activated carbon, platinized asbestos, rare earth metals, uranium compounds, chromic oxide, or some nickel compounds to accelerate the conversion of the liquid hydrogen into parahydrogen, or supply additional refrigeration equipment to absorb the heat that the orthohydrogen fraction will release as it spontaneously converts into parahydrogen. If orthohydrogen is not removed from liquid hydrogen, the heat released during its decay can boil off as much as 50% of the original liquid.[[/QUOTE]

Then there's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_embrittlement

Hydrogen gas has a density of 0.09g / L

A 50 litre car fuel tank could hold 4.5g of the stuff, about the same mass as two teaspoons of LPG.


As a liquid ? Again very low density but for spaceflight that's an advantage since for every Kg you can save on the second stage of a rocket can save 5Kg on the first stage. But you don't need to store it for long. Even the third stage of the Saturn V only stored it for a few hours https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn_V#S-IVB_third_stage

This parking orbit was quite low by Earth orbit standards, and it would have been short-lived due to aerodynamic drag. This was not a problem on a lunar mission because of the short stay in the parking orbit. The S-IVB also continued to thrust at a low level by venting gaseous hydrogen, to keep propellants settled in their tanks and prevent gaseous cavities from forming in propellant feed lines. This venting also maintained safe pressures as liquid hydrogen boiled off in the fuel tank. This venting thrust easily exceeded aerodynamic drag.

When you need to store it longer term or when weight isn't ultra-critical ( a rocket is over 90% fuel ) hydrogen doesn't offer any advantages over the fossil fuels it's made from.




You can make hydrogen from renewables but at present the hydrogen would be earmarked for adding to the natural gas mains or for making hydrocarbons , or perhaps as an industrial feed stock to places like fertilizer factories that already use the stuff.

nokia69

a long but very interesting video about Tesla motors and what they are about to do

Game, set, and match to the battery

Capt'n Midnight

nokia69 wrote: »

long but very interesting video about Tesla motors and what they are about to do

Game, set, and match to the battery

They aren't cheap or even close to cheap
http://www.teslamotors.com/blog/2013-model-s-price-increase


That said the competition is shooting themselves in the foot. It's gotten to the point where you nearly wouldn't buy a new model of car anymore.

Since the 1980's
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jimgorzelany/2014/03/26/automakers-with-the-lowest-and-highest-recall-rates/According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, last year the auto industry recalled close to a third more vehicles in the U.S. (22 million) than it sold (just over 15 million).
...

Mercedes-Benz USA: 2.1 million recalled/5.2 million sold; 0.41 recall rate.
Mazda Motor Corp: 5.2 million recalled/9.4 million sold; 0.55 recall rate.
General Motors: 99.3 million recalled/153.2 million sold; 0.65 recall rate.
Nissan North America: 19.1 million recalled/26.8 million sold; 0.71 recall rate.
Subaru of America: 4.3 million recalled/6.0 million sold; 0.73 recall rate.
Kia Motors: 3.7 million recalled/4.9 million sold; 0.77 recall rate.
Toyota Motor Corp: 38.6 million recalled/48.1 million sold; 0.80 recall rate.
BMW of North America: 5.1 million recalled/5.7 million sold; 0.90 recall rate.
Ford Motor Co: 97.0 million recalled/104.7 million sold; 0.93 recall rate.
American Honda Motor Co: 31.1 million recalled/32.9 million sold; 0.94 recall rate.
Chrysler Group: 63.2 million recalled/63.2 million sold; 1.00 recall rate.
Volvo Cars of North America: 3.3 million recalled/3.1 million sold; 1.05 recall rate.
Volkswagen of America: 10.2 million recalled/9.7 million sold; 1.06 recall rate.
Mitsubishi Motors North America: 5.3 million recalled/4.8 million sold; 1.09 recall rate.
Hyundai Motor Co: 9.9 million recalled/8.7 million sold; 1.15 recall rate.

nokia69

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

They aren't cheap or even close to cheap
http://www.teslamotors.com/blog/2013-model-s-price-increase

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of course the model S is not cheap, its a luxury high end car

but Tesla have the lowest battery costs and using batteries to store electricity today they can make money

when the giga factory is up and running their battery costs will fall even more, about 30%, and thats when we will see batteries used on a massive scale to store energy

Capt'n Midnight

nokia69 wrote: »

but Tesla have the lowest battery costs and using batteries to store electricity today they can make money

when the giga factory is up and running their battery costs will fall even more, about 30%, and thats when we will see batteries used on a massive scale to store energy

Battery costs are fine for very short term storage, as in seconds to maybe minutes where you can get paid to provide reserve power or load balance.

The Tesla S has an 85KWh battery



Todays wholesale SMP price varied by about 1c/KWh across the day http://www.sem-o.com/Pages/default.aspx

That means 85c worth of electricity margin, if the battery was 100% efficient.

For that you're investing maybe €40K upfront and €12K every 1,000 charges (as if) and YMMV a lot. Also and this is REALLY important, deep discharges / overcharging really affect the life of Lithium batteries. So if you want longer life you don't want to use the full 85KWh


BTW
If the charging/discharging cycle was only 80% efficient then the cost of the electricity you sell today is the same as what it cost to buy.

You can play around with the numbers , but remember you won't always be able to sell 100% of the energy every day

Also you are talking about batteries in cars then peak electricity demand is normally a little after everyone arrives home from work

nokia69

we don't know how much it costs Tesla to build a model S battery pack, but we do know the cost is falling

i'm not really sure how people will use batteries in the future and if you watch the video, Tesla are not sure what will happen, but right now they can see with falling storage costs some very interesting things can start to happen

its all just proof on concept right now, but in a few years it will be a big business

Capt'n Midnight

nokia69 wrote: »

we don't know how much it costs Tesla to build a model S battery pack, but we do know the cost is falling

i'm not really sure how people will use batteries in the future and if you watch the video, Tesla are not sure what will happen, but right now they can see with falling storage costs some very interesting things can start to happen

its all just proof on concept right now, but in a few years it will be a big business

Wishful thinking and PR doesn't change the numbers.

It's no secret that cheap energy storage would mean we could start phasing out fossil fuel tomorrow.

And it's no secret that the only thing that's been holding electric cars back for the last 120 years has been the size, weight , cost and re-charge time for batteries. Excluding the battery things like top speed, acceleration, reliability and maintenance costs are excellent https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_speed_record#1898.E2.80.931965_.28wheel-driven.29


It's just that at present almost all energy storage is Hydo in Dams 1,127 GW on tap, next comes Pumped Storage at 127GW and together they represent 99.9% of non-fossil fuel grid energy storage.

Most of the rest used to be Compressed air energy storage, at 0.4 GW ( and that's just two sites)
but there's been a lot of high temperature sodium-sulfur batteries too so may also be 0.4GW , and either completely dwarf all remaining installed energy storage systems

There's some lead acid and there's lots of PR about Lithium but we're talking tiny amounts. And yes there's 52MW of NiCad in Alaska but it's only good for 15 minutes but pumped storage, sodium sulfur and CAES are good for hours and the water stored in a dam could be good for weeks



I'd nearly consider Nuclear to be a form of energy storage since there are massive fossil fuel inputs in mining, construction and decommissioning that occur at different times to when you get power from the plant.



I just can't see lithium being the solution to grid backup given that it's much more useful in vehicles being light and all that.

It might have a niche on a dumb grid making renewables look more dispatcable but on a smart grid it would be completely undercut by demand shedding


Diversity in generating sources might be a better option than storage.
There's about 46MW of Landfill gas in use here and another 38MW or so of biomass (mostly co-firing in Edenderry)
Doesn't sound like much but compared to the global installed capacity of lithium or lead acid battery backup it would be significant.

nokia69

Capt'n Midnight did you watch the video ?

in the video he makes the very same point as you, ie right now there is almost no battery storage, already Tesla with one system at their factory, another system at a supercharger, and about 1000 home systems, and that makes up 1 or 2 % of all battery storage in the world, so you are right its tiny

but once they finish their battery factory they will build 15GWh a year just for storage, and the rest about 35GWh will be for cars

its not PR or wishful thinking, they WILL do this

OPEC should be very worried