4 ms·

Why not liquefy air when electricity is low price, use a heat engine between your liquefied air and your power plant heatsink, then use that now heated/compress

Why not liquefy air when electricity is low price, use a heat engine between your liquefied air and your power plant heatsink, then use that now heated/compressed gas as input for a turbine? Plus - you can sell liquefied gases (nitrogen and oxygen).

rini17 6y ago
Air must be filtered and completely desiccated (else the ice clogs everything). Then you need huge cryogenic tank. Also the extra peaker turbine costs something. Efficiency of whole setup is abysmal compared to batteries.
- ggm 6y ago
  Air storage is actually a thing, drying included. it uses salt domes, or other large underground structures. You can do this when you have the facilities, just as people with thermal can do thermal. Doesn't work everywhere, can work where you have the right conditions. Same for CCS: It can work, with huge if-but-maybe, and is well known to work for oil & gas field injection to increase production. The downsides are fugitive gas release. All attempts at CCS for "clean" coal have turned out to fail, AFAIK (economically, if not practically, but mostly practically: its hard)
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
kieranmaine 6y ago
See https://www.edie.net/news/8/World-s-biggest-liquid-air-battery-under-construction-in-Greater-Manchester/ https://www.edie.net/news/8/World-s-biggest-liquid-air-batte...
- yetihehe 6y ago
  Exactly, that's what I'm talking about. Batteries are good for just storing electricity, LAES should be even better when you have heat you already need to get rid of (like those big cooling chimneys). In many generators you need to actively get rid of lots of heat, usually it's just dumped. Cogeneration should be much more common.
thehappypm 6y ago
Your system requires: * Air filtration * An air liquidation mechanism (cooling system + pressurization system) * A heat engine * Liquified air storage system * A turbine This is why exotic storage systems don't really pan out. Unless you already have 80% of the infrastructure already lying around (like in pumped hydro storage), you're better off buying batteries than buying the myriad of systems needed for some exotic energy storage system.

rini17 6y ago

Air must be filtered and completely desiccated (else the ice clogs everything). Then you need huge cryogenic tank. Also the extra peaker turbine costs something. Efficiency of whole setup is abysmal compared to batteries.

ggm 6y ago
Air storage is actually a thing, drying included. it uses salt domes, or other large underground structures. You can do this when you have the facilities, just as people with thermal can do thermal. Doesn't work everywhere, can work where you have the right conditions. Same for CCS: It can work, with huge if-but-maybe, and is well known to work for oil & gas field injection to increase production. The downsides are fugitive gas release. All attempts at CCS for "clean" coal have turned out to fail, AFAIK (economically, if not practically, but mostly practically: its hard)
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]

kieranmaine 6y ago

See https://www.edie.net/news/8/World-s-biggest-liquid-air-battery-under-construction-in-Greater-Manchester/ https://www.edie.net/news/8/World-s-biggest-liquid-air-batte...

yetihehe 6y ago
Exactly, that's what I'm talking about. Batteries are good for just storing electricity, LAES should be even better when you have heat you already need to get rid of (like those big cooling chimneys). In many generators you need to actively get rid of lots of heat, usually it's just dumped. Cogeneration should be much more common.

thehappypm 6y ago

Your system requires: * Air filtration * An air liquidation mechanism (cooling system + pressurization system) * A heat engine * Liquified air storage system * A turbine This is why exotic storage systems don't really pan out. Unless you already have 80% of the infrastructure already lying around (like in pumped hydro storage), you're better off buying batteries than buying the myriad of systems needed for some exotic energy storage system.