4 ms·

I think Pumped Hydroelectric Storage is what you are looking for. I've seen a few of them here in Switzerland. I think many were originally built out with the t

by yayana 8y ago

I think Pumped Hydroelectric Storage is what you are looking for. I've seen a few of them here in Switzerland. I think many were originally built out with the train system's grid for it's reliably scheduled low and high capacity times. http://energystorage.org/energy-storage/technologies/pumped-hydroelectric-storage http://energystorage.org/energy-storage/technologies/pumped-...

gamegoblin 8y ago
Does Belgium (OPs example) have the geography necessary to support pumped hydro? Your example, Switzerland, is significantly more mountainous than Belgium.
- DoctorOetker 8y ago
  I know of at least one pumped storage dam in Belgium, in the mountainous southern part (Wallonia)
- yvdriess 8y ago
  Wallonia has at least one pumped hydro that I know of. There were plants for a 'energy island' 300MW hydro plant at sea, near the large-scale wind farms. The idea is the same, pump sea water up an artificial horse-shoe shaped island. A nice bonus is that you can play with the tides as well. The height difference does not have to be great, if you can compensate with a large surface area. As far as I know, those plans were shelved. A quick googling says that similar concepts are being considered for interconnected dutch/danish wind farms.
- markvdb 8y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coo-Trois-Ponts_Hydroelectric_Power_Station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coo-Trois-Ponts_Hydroelectric_... It has 1164MW capacity, with ~1000GWh/year supplied.
petre 8y ago
Also flywheel storage. Eg: http://schwungrad-energie.com/schwungrads-success-eu-horizon-2020-programme/ http://schwungrad-energie.com/schwungrads-success-eu-horizon...
surfingtheweb 8y ago
Is there a way to implement gravity batteries on a household-level scale? Shouldn't we all be using solar to lift a weight during the day that will lower during the night to feed the grid?
rmetzler 8y ago
There is a video in German on youtube where Prof. Hans Werner Sinn explains, why Germany can't store the excessive amounts of renewable energy in Pumped Hydroelectric Storage. You would need too much storage capacity, especially since you need two basins and the geological features necessary aren't there. He even calculated how this would work in a compound with Norway. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rV_0uHP3BDY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rV_0uHP3BDY I really doubt Germany's "Energiewende" is really possible, since solar doesn't generate energy at night and wind energy has really large spikes. This is not the energy you want to have in a large grid and storage isn't possible at such volume. I even calculated how many Tesla walls a city like Munich would need to have a week worth of energy stored and I really, really doubt, this is physically possible or economically viable. Germany's "Energiewende" is something politicians would like to have, but the problems and cost this is causing (google "site:heise.de tennet") aren't shared fair.
- Kliment 8y ago
  This is somewhat misleading - there is a Europe-wide energy grid, Germany has many neighbors, and a lot of power has been flowing across borders even before this project started. It doesn't make sense to look at Germany in isolation. While I agree that the German approach is misguided (should have shut down coal first, not nuclear) I don't think it's as problematic as you make it seem - the spikes in wind average out excellently when you look on the scale of several countries, and daytime demand for solar power is large and growing due to industrial use (residential use peaks in the evenings, but residential use is insignificant compared to industry). A significant component of the Energiewende is replacing baseload fossils (coal) with peaker gas plants but the coal industry is very powerful and very much opposed to this, and many local governments are in coal industry pockets and resist any coal reduction (this is one reason why nuclear was shut down first). Peaker gas plants operate only when the demand is high and supply is low, running on a much lower duty cycle than a baseload plant. The way things are going now, there's been a rapid nuclear phaseout and there's a glacial coal phaseout very slowly happening, but solar and wind installations have been growing and are displacing more and more baseload. Eventually this will price baseload coal power out of the market, and then we'll see if the coal terrorists are powerful enough to get a bailout or to get solar legally destroyed like they did in Spain.
howard941 8y ago
A few alternative storage mechanisms: - Splitting water into the fuels for fuel cells - Converting in-ground swimming pool to neighborhood-scale battery

by yayana 8y ago

gamegoblin 8y ago

Does Belgium (OPs example) have the geography necessary to support pumped hydro? Your example, Switzerland, is significantly more mountainous than Belgium.

DoctorOetker 8y ago
I know of at least one pumped storage dam in Belgium, in the mountainous southern part (Wallonia)
yvdriess 8y ago
Wallonia has at least one pumped hydro that I know of. There were plants for a 'energy island' 300MW hydro plant at sea, near the large-scale wind farms. The idea is the same, pump sea water up an artificial horse-shoe shaped island. A nice bonus is that you can play with the tides as well. The height difference does not have to be great, if you can compensate with a large surface area. As far as I know, those plans were shelved. A quick googling says that similar concepts are being considered for interconnected dutch/danish wind farms.
markvdb 8y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coo-Trois-Ponts_Hydroelectric_Power_Station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coo-Trois-Ponts_Hydroelectric_... It has 1164MW capacity, with ~1000GWh/year supplied.

petre 8y ago

Also flywheel storage. Eg: http://schwungrad-energie.com/schwungrads-success-eu-horizon-2020-programme/ http://schwungrad-energie.com/schwungrads-success-eu-horizon...

surfingtheweb 8y ago

Is there a way to implement gravity batteries on a household-level scale? Shouldn't we all be using solar to lift a weight during the day that will lower during the night to feed the grid?

rmetzler 8y ago

There is a video in German on youtube where Prof. Hans Werner Sinn explains, why Germany can't store the excessive amounts of renewable energy in Pumped Hydroelectric Storage. You would need too much storage capacity, especially since you need two basins and the geological features necessary aren't there. He even calculated how this would work in a compound with Norway. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rV_0uHP3BDY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rV_0uHP3BDY I really doubt Germany's "Energiewende" is really possible, since solar doesn't generate energy at night and wind energy has really large spikes. This is not the energy you want to have in a large grid and storage isn't possible at such volume. I even calculated how many Tesla walls a city like Munich would need to have a week worth of energy stored and I really, really doubt, this is physically possible or economically viable. Germany's "Energiewende" is something politicians would like to have, but the problems and cost this is causing (google "site:heise.de tennet") aren't shared fair.

Kliment 8y ago
This is somewhat misleading - there is a Europe-wide energy grid, Germany has many neighbors, and a lot of power has been flowing across borders even before this project started. It doesn't make sense to look at Germany in isolation. While I agree that the German approach is misguided (should have shut down coal first, not nuclear) I don't think it's as problematic as you make it seem - the spikes in wind average out excellently when you look on the scale of several countries, and daytime demand for solar power is large and growing due to industrial use (residential use peaks in the evenings, but residential use is insignificant compared to industry). A significant component of the Energiewende is replacing baseload fossils (coal) with peaker gas plants but the coal industry is very powerful and very much opposed to this, and many local governments are in coal industry pockets and resist any coal reduction (this is one reason why nuclear was shut down first). Peaker gas plants operate only when the demand is high and supply is low, running on a much lower duty cycle than a baseload plant. The way things are going now, there's been a rapid nuclear phaseout and there's a glacial coal phaseout very slowly happening, but solar and wind installations have been growing and are displacing more and more baseload. Eventually this will price baseload coal power out of the market, and then we'll see if the coal terrorists are powerful enough to get a bailout or to get solar legally destroyed like they did in Spain.

howard941 8y ago

A few alternative storage mechanisms: - Splitting water into the fuels for fuel cells - Converting in-ground swimming pool to neighborhood-scale battery