Solar energy can now be stored for up to 18 years say scientists’,’Major solar breakthrough means energy can be stored for up to 18 years
https://www.euronews.com/green/2022/04/12/solar-energy-can-now-be-stored-for-up-to-18-years-say-scientists?utm_source=Reddit&utm_medium=Social
12 Comments
Another blow for fossil fuels 🤙🏾
Interesting, also sulphur cycle and CO2 electrolysis, which may be enhanced in efficiency with solar thermal as its an endothermic reaction, are ways to do this also. A closed cycle can be envisaged by binding CO2 in the oxidation step to CaO, which releases more heat.
Now we only need an application where long term energy storage is needed (hint: for a grid based 100% on PV and wind it isn’t)
It’s called a tree
I feel like the article is doing a disservice here by emphasizing the “18 YEARS!” bit since that sounds almost irrelevant. So they’ve come up with a molecule that forms a fairly stable isomer when exposed to “sunlight” in a kind of endothermic transformation which can be reversed with some kind of exposure to a catalyst of some kind, releasing heat in the process. From the very unclear language in the article, it sounds basically like a thermoelectric flow battery that holds “charge” for well longer than would be required for grid storage needs in an intermittent renewables dominated electricity generation regime, which sounds pretty cool, but it all sounds very much lab tech at the moment. It is very possible that we’ll never hear about this again unless certain thresholds of efficiency, energy density, cost, and scalability are met.
>Now the researchers have succeeded in getting the system to produce electricity by connecting it to a thermoelectric generator.
Would be nice if the article mentioned whether data on the effecinecy is already known, since thermoelectric generators typically have an efficiency of less than 10%.
Also why thermo electric generators are used in the first place. It’s not like there aren’t other ways to turn heat into electricity.
We already have green ammonia and e-fuel such as synthetic methane. So it comes down to cost, which is going to act as a proxy for efficiency, scalability, etc.
Edit: I’m not dumping on this specific technology. Just saying there are already ways to store solar/wind energy for longer periods. Though I’m skeptical you need 18 years worth of storage. If the sun and wind take a hiatus for 18 years, we’re pretty much dead anyway.
Why is most science communication with anything to do with solar total garbage.
Trees store it for hundreds of years and even millions if you allow them to turn into oil or coal.
How long the energy can be stored for isn’t really that useful of a figure of merit, especially beyond the few year mark. Cost per KWh and KW of storage capacity along with cost/losses per KWh stored and other operating costs are what really matter.
Click bait.
Why does mcafee show up to “scan my device” when I try to read the article?
Without reading the article – storage is separate from solar.
Storage can be applied to ANY energy and not just solar.
Solar energy is specific to the photoelectric effect, or the molten salt debacle.
I can put a book on a table and its kinetic energy is stored until 50 years later when I push it off.
I can use solar energy to feed electrolysis and make hydrogen and store it “forever”.
And, who the hell wants to store the energy that long? People want to use stored solar energy in the interim until the array provides power again ( like overnight)
So I call bullshit on this headline for multiple reasons. Perhaps someone who was willing to be scanned will tell me why I’m wrong.
The idea of isomer transitions as a way to store energy is interesting, but there’s not much information here. Storage and retrieval efficiencies are obviously important, as are volume and weight energy densities. It sounds as though the retrieval of the energy is as heat, which I would expect to mean a fairly low efficiency. But until we have numbers we won’t know how this compares to batteries and other forms of energy storage. It’s probably way to early to say anything very meaningful about costs.