#Sand Battery: An Innovative Energy Storage Solution

[fadi123]

sand battery

What Is a ‘Sand Battery’ 2023?

A “sand battery” is a high temperature thermal energy storage that uses sand or sand-like materials as its storage medium. It stores energy in sand as heat. 

Its main purpose is to work as a high-power and high-capacity reservoir for excess wind and solar energy. The energy is stored as heat, which can be used to heat homes, or to provide hot steam and high temperature process heat to industries that are often fossil-fuel dependent.

As the world shifts towards higher and higher renewables fraction in electricity production, the intermittent nature of these energy sources cause challenges to energy networks. The sand battery helps to ambitiously upscale renewables production by ensuring there’s always a way to benefit from clean energy, even if the surplus is massive.

The first commercial sand battery in the world is in a town called Kankaanpää, Western Finland. It is connected to a district heating network and heating residential and commercial buildings such as family homes and the municipal swimming pool. The district heating network is operated by an energy utility called Vatajankoski.

The term “sand battery” was introduced to grand audience by a BBC News story published the 5th of July 2022. The story was written by BBC News’ Environmental Correspondent Matt McGrath.

Read the story: BBC News: Climate change: 'Sand battery' could solve green energy's big problem

Watch the video: BBC News: How the world's first sand battery stores green power

UPDATE: We’ve been getting a lot of attention after our sand battery went viral. Due to a massive amount of requests and messages, our reply times can be very long. We appreciate your patience. Thank you! Please also note that we don’t have products for individual homes yet.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the structure of your heat storage?

It is an insulated silo made of steel housing, filled with sand and heat transfer pipes. Additionally, equipment outside the storage is required, such as automation components, valves, a fan, and a heat exchanger or a steam generator.

How do you heat the sand?

With electricity from the grid or from local production, in both cases from fluctuating sources such as wind and solar. We charge it when clean and cheap electricity is available. The electrical energy is transferred to the heat storage using a closed loop air-pipe arrangement. Air is heated up using electrical resistors and circulated in the heat transfer piping.

How hot is the sand?

The maximum temperature in the Kankaanpää heat storage is about 600 degrees Celsius. However, the temperature may even be higher depending on customer needs. In practice, the maximum temperature of a sand-based heat storage is not limited by the properties of the storage medium, but by the heat resistance of the materials used in the construction and control of the storage.

How do you get heat out of the heat storage?

The heat storage is unloaded by blowing cool air through the pipes. It heats up as it passes through the storage, and it can be used for example to convert water into process steam or to heat district heating water in an air-to-water heat exchanger.

Why do you use sand?

Many solid materials, such as sand, can be heated to temperatures well above the boiling point of water. Sand-based heat storages can store several times the amount of energy that can be stored in a water tank of a similar size; this is thanks to the large temperature range allowed by the sand. So, it saves space and it allows versatile use in many industrial applications.

What kind of a sand you are using?

The heat storage is not very sensitive to sand grain size. We prefer high density, low-cost materials that are not from scarce sources. Someone else’s dirt could be our heat storage medium. We prefer to use materials that are not suitable for construction industry.

Does it matter what the grain size of the sand is?

Not much, we prefer to use those grain sizes that are not suitable for construction industry.

How is the heat storage insulated?

The heat storage is made of steel and insulated with standard, heat resistant insulating materials. The insulation is all around the heat storage between the outer steel layer and the inner one.

How long does the sand stay hot in the winter?

It can stay hot for months if needed, but the actual use case of the heat storage in Kankaanpää is to charge it in about 2-week cycles. The heat storage has its best range of use when it is charged and discharged 20 to 200 times per year, depending on the application.

Is the outer surface of the heat storage hot?

The surface of the storage is not hot, because the heat stays inside the storage—where it should be.

Can it store electricity?

Not as such, as it stores energy in the form of heat. The heat can be converted back to electricity using turbines like the ORC-turbine or a steam turbine. This requires additional investments to the turbine technology, and the conversion to electricity has inherent losses, thus complicating the economical side.

Is this a new technology?

Well, yes and no. The idea of heating sand to store energy is not new. Our way of doing things and commercializing it in large scale applications is.

#Sand Battery: An Innovative Energy Storage Solution #In recent years #the world has seen a growing demand for renewable energy sources that can help reduce our dependence on fossil fuels and mitigate the effec #energy storage remains a major challenge for the wider adoption of these technologies. This is where the sand battery comes in #an innovative energy storage solution that has been gaining traction in the scientific community. #A sand battery is a type of rechargeable battery that uses sand as its electrolyte #the substance that facilitates the flow of electric current. The concept of using sand in batteries is not new #as it has been studied since the 1980s. However #recent advancements in nanotechnology have made it possible to create high-performance sand batteries that are more efficient #durable #and cost-effective than ever before. #The basic principle behind a sand battery is simple. The battery consists of two electrodes #an anode and a cathode #separated by a layer of sand. When the battery is charged #electrons flow from the anode to the cathode through the sand #creating a flow of electricity. When the battery is discharged #the process is reversed #and the electrons flow back to the anode #providing electrical power. #One of the key advantages of sand batteries is their high energy density #which means they can store a large amount of energy in a small space. This makes them ideal for use in applications where space is limited #such as in mobile devices and electric vehicles. In addition #sand batteries are non-toxic #environmentally friendly #and have a long lifespan #making them a more sustainable energy storage solution compared to traditional batteries. #Another advantage of sand batteries is their low cost. Unlike traditional batteries that use expensive metals such as lithium and cobalt #sand batteries use abundant and widely available materials such as sand #graphite #and aluminum. This makes them a more affordable energy storage solution

[fknhost]

Bioplex and Controllis: Turning farm waste and sunshine into electricity

  I nnovative biogas and solar power system provides onsite power from plant and animal waste Farms and local communities could soon be able to go off-grid, with self-sufficiency in mains electricity and heat thanks to a breakthrough biogas and solar power system. The self-contained, onsite electricity generating solution uses a mix of solar power alongside biogas made from both plant and animal waste. The new hybrid system from Bioplex and Controllis could not only reduce or eliminate electricity costs but even provide profits. It will also help the environment and reduce the cost and effort of dealing with waste products from the farm. It even provides fertiliser as an end product. Chris Reynell, Managing Director of Bioplex, says: “Farmers face a real challenge dealing with both plant and animal waste. It seems crazy just to spread it, whilst losing nutrients to the atmosphere and watercourses, when it can easily be turned into electricity.” He adds that farms by their nature tend to be in rural, often remote locations, so getting a reliable three phase mains supply to the site can be expensive and disruptive. The electricity also often comes with a higher than normal tariff. “Farmers face higher electricity and fertiliser costs and waste storage and spreading that’s subject to more regulations and costs. Bioplex and Controllis have solved both challenges,” he says. Bioplex has pioneered a high throughput system which turns grass and energy crops and a wide range of animal and food waste into natural fertiliser and biogas. The recovered and stabilised fertiliser is re-used on the farm and the biogas generates electricity. Due to its unique patented design, the Bioplex system occupies a low footprint and offers fast, easy deployment. The digester can use slurry, farmyard and horse stable manure, collected pasture toppings along with crop waste whilst simultaneously controlling parasites, pathogens, weeds and odour and minimising production of excess liquid. The solid and/or liquid natural fertiliser is easy to use, and a major cost saving compared to conventional slurry spreading. The Bioplex system is typically 20% more efficient at biogas production compared to rival systems, and can easily remove non-fuel generating and damaging materials such as grit and sand. The system can also, uniquely, control biogas production down to a 30-minute period. This provides clean, renewable almost on-demand energy production. Controllis provides the ultra-efficient, highly reliable hybrid power solution: a biogas powered 12kW DC Genset generator, solar power arrays, battery bank and 75kW AC Mains Inverters. The Controllis system also provides cloud-based remote management and data analytics to enable farmers and landowners to understand, control and optimise system performance. The on-site power is used to run the farm (such as milking, pasteurisation, lighting, grain drying, cleaning, storage etc) and to provide power to local premises. The system is also metered and can feed back into the mains grid to generate additional revenues. The unique Controllis generator technology produces electricity much more efficiently than conventional generators, reducing biogas use. The solar arrays contribute to energy production and a dedicated battery provides power when no biogas is being produced. The result is a highly reliable, very cost-effective way to generate power on-site. Chris Reynell of Bioplex says: “We chose to partner with Controllis because of their innovative approach and ability to efficiently link power generated from biogas with solar, wind and micro hydro - all renewable and low carbon energy sources.” Lance Davidson, Vice President of Engineering at Controllis, adds: “All aspects of the system have been optimised to maximise energy production, recycle farm waste as effectively and efficiently as possible and minimise the impact to the environment. Ultimately, this means that farms can now be self-sufficient, provide their own independent, reliable power, save (and potentially make money on) electricity costs and reduce their carbon footprint.” About Bioplex Bioplex is a research and development company which pioneered the use of hybrid aerobic and anaerobic multi stage digestion in Europe. The new generation digesters have a faster and more rugged process and use a greater range of feedstocks. About Controllis Controllis is a power systems hardware and software company headquartered in the UK and working with partners and customers world-wide. The Controllis products range from standalone DC generator units up to fully integrated hybrid renewable systems. Our advanced cloud-based remote management system provides detailed visibility and analytics of your power network performance in real-time. The Controllis mission is to provide cost-effective power anywhere by using our unique technology to deliver reduced operating costs, lower risks and better network insights to customers – Better Power Anywhere. Contact information Bioplex: www.bioplex.co.uk [email protected] Controllis: www.controllis.com [email protected]  

Outback Bark

Read more

Outdoor Waterproof Solar Motion Sensor Wall Lamp

R 510.00 Add to basket

Reusable Stainless Steel Drinking Straws

Sale! R 3.90 – R 22.24 Select options

Stainless Steel Water Bottles

Sale! R 128.39 – R 166.95 Select options Read the full article

[djgblogger-blog]

ANYbotics wins ICRA 2018 Robot Launch competition!

http://bit.ly/2yXbHlX

The four-legged design of ANYmal allows the robot to conquer difficult terrain such as gravel, sand, and snow. Photo credit: ETH Zurich / Andreas Eggenberger.

ANYbotics led the way in the ICRA 2018 Robot Launch Startup Competition on May 22, 2018 at the Brisbane Conference Center in Australia. Although ANYbotics pitched last out of the 10 startups presenting, they clearly won over the judges and audience. As competition winners, ANYbotics received a $3,000 prize from QUT bluebox, Australia’s robotics accelerator (currently taking applications for 2018!), plus Silicon Valley Robotics membership and mentoring from The Robotics Hub.

ANYbotics is a Swiss startup creating fabulous four legged robots like ANYmal and the core component, the ANYdrive highly integrated modular robotic joint actuator. Founded in 2016 by a group of ETH Zurich engineers, ANYbotics is a spin-off company of the Robotic Systems Lab (RSL), ETH Zurich.

ANYmal moves and operates autonomously in challenging terrain and interacts safely with the environment. As a multi-purpose robot platform, it is applicable on industrial indoor or outdoor sites for inspection and manipulation tasks, in natural terrain or debris areas for search and rescue tasks, or on stage for animation and entertainment. Its four legs allow the robot to crawl, walk, run, dance, jump, climb, carry — whatever the task requires.

ANYdrive is a highly integrated modular robotic joint actuator that guarantees

very precise, low-impedance torque control,

high impact robustness,

safe interaction,

intermittent energy storage and peak power amplification

Motor, gear, titanium spring, sensors, and motor electronics are incorporated in a compact and sealed (IP67) unit and connected by a EtherCAT and power bus. With ANYdrive joint actuators, any kinematic structure such as a robot arm or leg can be built without additional bearings, encoders or power electronics.

ANYdrive’s innovative design allows for highly dynamic movements and collision maneuvers without damage from impulsive contact forces, and at the same time for highly sensitive force controlled interaction with the environment. This is of special interest for robots that should interact with humans, such as collaborative and mobile robots.

ICRA 2018 finalists and judges; Roland Siegwart from ETH Zurich, Juliana Lim from SGInnovate, Yotam Rosenbaum from QUT bluebox, Martin Duursma from Main Sequence Ventures and Chris Moehle from The Robotics Hub Fund.

The ICRA 2018 Robot Launch Startup Competition was judged by experienced roboticists, investors and entrepreneurs. Roland Siegwart is a Professor at ETH Zurich’s Autonomous Systems Lab and cofounder of many successful robotics spinouts. Juliana Lim is Head of Talent from SGInnovate, a Singapore venture capital arm specializing in pre-seed, seed, startup, early-stage, and Series A investments in deep technologies, starting with artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics.

Yotam Rosenbaum is the ICT Entrepreneur in Residence at QUT bluebox, building on successful exits from global startups. Martin Duursma is a venture partner in Main Sequence Ventures, Australia’s new innovation fund specializing in AI, robotics and deep tech like biotech, quantum computing and the space industry. Chris Moehle is the managing partner at The Robotics Hub Fund, who may invest up to $250,000 in the overall winner of the Robot Launch Startup Competition 2018.

Organized by Silicon Valley Robotics, the Robot Launch competition is in it’s 5th year and has seen hundreds of startups from more than 20 countries around the globe. The MC for the evening, Silicon Valley Robotics Director Andra Keay, said “Some of the best robotics startups come from places like Switzerland or Australia, but to get funding and to grow fast, they usually need to spend some time in Silicon Valley.”

“The Robot Launch competition allows us to reach startups from all over the world and get them in front of top investors. Many of these startups have gone on to win major events and awards like TechCrunch Battlefield and CES Innovation Awards. So we know that robotics is also coming of age.”

As well as ANYbotics, the other 9 startups gave great pitches. In order of appearance they were:

Purple Robotics

Micromelon Robotics

EXGwear

HEBI Robotics

Abyss Solutions

EyeSyght

Niska Retail Robotics

Aubot

Sevensense

Purple Robotics creates drones for work, which fly for 3x longer than, or carry 3x the payload of existing commercial drones, due to their innovative design. They are not standard quadrocopters but they use the same battery technology. Purple Robotics drones are also gust resistant, providing maximum stability in the air and enabling them to fly closer to structures.

Micromelon creates a seamless integration between visual and text coding, with the ability to translate between the two languages in real time. Students and teachers are able to quickly begin programming the wireless robots. The teacher dashboard and software are designed to work together to assist teachers who may have minimal experience in coding, to instruct a class of students through the transition. Students are able to backtrack to blocks, see how the program looks as text or view both views at once students are able to be supported throughout the entire journey.

EXGwear is currently developing a “hands-free”, intuitive interaction method, in the form of a portable wearable device that is extremely compact, non-obtrusive, and comfortable to wear long hours to help disabled people solve their daily interaction problems with the environment. Our first product, EXGbuds, a customizable earbud-like device is based on patent-pending biosensing technology and machine learning-enabled App. It can measure eye movement and facial expression physiological signals at extremely high accuracy to generate user-specific actionable commands for seamless interaction with the smart IoTs and robotic devices.

HEBI Robotics produces Lego-like robotic building blocks. Our platform consists of hardware and software that make it easy to design, build and program world class robotics quickly. Our hardware platform is robust, flexible, and safe. Our cross-platform software development tools take care of the difficult math that’s required to develop a robot so that the roboticist can focus on the creative aspects of robot design.

Abyss Solutions delivers key innovations in Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs) and sensor technology to collect high fidelity, multi-modal data comprehensively across underwater inspections. By pushing the state-of-the-art in machine learning and data analytics, accurate and efficient condition assessments can be conducted and used to build an asset database. The database is able to grow over repeat inspection and the objectivity of the analytics enables automated change tracking. The output is a comprehensive asset representation that can enable efficient risk management for critical infrastructure.

EyeSyght is TV for your fingers. As humans we use our senses to gather and collect information to analyse the environment around us and create a mental picture of our surroundings. But what about touch? When we operate our smartphones, tablets and computers we interact with a flat piece of glass. Now through the use of Haptic Feedback, Electrical Impulses, Ultra Sound, EyeSyght will enable any surface to render Shapes, Textures, Depth, and much much more.

Niska Retail Robotics is reimagining retail, starting with icecream. “Customer demands are shifting away from products and towards services and experiences.” (CSIRO, 2017) Niska creates wonderful customer experiences with robot servers scooping out delicious gourmet icecream for you, 24/7.

Aubot (‘au’ is to meet in Japanese – pronounced “our-bot”) is focused on building robots that help us in our everyday lives. The company was founded in April 2013 by Marita Cheng, Young Australian of the Year 2012. Our first product, Teleport, is a telepresence robot. Teleport will reduce people’s need to travel while allowing them greater freedom to explore new surroundings. In the future, aubot aims to combine Jeva and Teleport to create a telepresence robot with an arm attached.

Sevensense (still based at ETH Zurich Autonomous Systems Lab) provide a visual localization system tailored to the needs of professional service robots. The use of cameras instead of laser rangefinders enables our product to perform more reliably, particularly in dynamic and geometrically ambiguous environments, and allows for a cost advantage. In addition, we offer market specific application modules along with the engineering services to successfully apply our product on the customer’s machinery.

We thank all the startups for sharing their pitches with us – the main hall at ICRA was packed and we look forward to hearing from more startups in the next rounds of Robot Launch 2018.

[technato]

A Critical Look at Claims for Green Technologies

Green technologies are not yet proved, affordable, or deployable—but even if they were, it would still take them generations to solve our environmental problems

Illustration: Stuart Bradford

.article-detail figure.rt { clear:none; } .mobileShow { display: none;}

/* Smartphone Portrait and Landscape */

@media only screen

and (min-device-width : 320px)

and (max-device-width : 480px){ .mobileShow { display: inline;} }

.mobileHide { display: inline;}

/* Smartphone Portrait and Landscape */

@media only screen

and (min-device-width : 320px)

and (max-device-width : 480px){ .mobileHide { display: none;} }

Illustration: Stuart Bradford

When a bright new idea comes along, it’s easy to imagine a fantastic future for it. Perhaps the best example of this is Ray Kurzweil’s Singularity, scheduled to arrive in 2045, which will supposedly bring “immortal software-based humans, and ultra-high levels of intelligence that expand outward in the universe at the speed of light.” Not to be left behind, a former Google X senior executive says that “everything you see in sci-fi movies is going to happen.” Not just something, mind you, but everything.

Compared with such utterly ahistorical visions, unmoored from reality, the articles gathered in this issue are actually quite tame. They promise only a long-lasting supply of affordable and clean energy—either through nuclear fission or through electricity derived from burning (yes, burning) CO2—and a surfeit of food from a variety of sources: vertical farms based in cities, crops that will need almost no fertilizer, and environmentally friendly meat substitutes.

Of course, these claims of impending innovation may be seen (although they are not labeled as such) as being largely aspirational—but the benefits would be great if even just a fraction of their goals were realized during the next generation.

At the same time, these claims should be appraised with unflinching realism. I would not presume to offer specific, in-depth critiques of proposed innovations even if I had 300 instead of three pages to work with. Instead, I will just point out some nontrivial complications pertaining to specific proposals, and above all, I will stress some fundamental systemic considerations that are too often ignored. These are not arguments against the need for some form of the techniques that are promoted here but rather cautionary reminders that many of today’s ambitions will not become tomorrow’s realities. It’s better to be pleasantly surprised than to be repeatedly disappointed.

Human beings have always sought innovation. The more recent phenomenon is this willingness to suspend disbelief. Credit this change to the effect that the electronics revolution has had on our perceptions of what is possible. Since the 1960s, there has been an extraordinarily rapid growth in the number of electronic components that we can fit onto a microchip. That growth, known as Moore’s Law, has led us to expect exponential improvements in other fields.

However, our civilization continues to depend on activities that require large flows of energy and materials, and alternatives to these requirements can’t be commercialized at rates that double every couple of years. Our modern societies are underpinned by countless industrial processes that have not changed fundamentally in two or even three generations. These include the way we generate most of our electricity, the way we smelt primary iron and aluminum, the way we grow staple foods and feed crops, the way we raise and slaughter animals, the way we excavate sand and make cement, the way we fly, and the way we transport cargo.

Some of these processes may well see some relatively fast changes in decades ahead, but they will not follow microchip-like exponential rates of improvement. Our world of nearly 8 billion people produces an economic output surpassing US $100 trillion. To keep that mighty engine running takes some 18 terawatts of primary energy and, per year, some 60 billion metric tons of materials, 2.6 billion metric tons of grain, and about 300 million metric tons of meat.

Any alternatives that could be deployed at such scales would require decades to diffuse through the world economy even if they were already perfectly proved, affordable, and ready for mass adoption. And none of the innovations presented in this issue fits fully into that category. In fact, these three critical prerequisites are notably absent from nearly all of the innovations presented in this issue.

Most of the articles do acknowledge that difficulties lie ahead, but the overall impression is one of an accelerating advance toward an ever more remarkable future. That needs some tempering. Today, we can fly for up to an hour in a two-seat, battery-powered trainer plane; in a decade, perhaps we’ll fly in a battery-assisted regional hybrid plane. The savings in energy use and in carbon emissions will be modest—and we are a very long way from all-electric intercontinental airliners.

The traveling-wave nuclear-fission reactor has many obvious advantages over the dominant pressurized water reactor, including remarkably safe operation and the ability to use spent nuclear fuel. But our experience with developing fast-breeder reactors, which are cooled with molten sodium, indicates how extraordinarily challenging it can be to translate an appealing concept into a commercially viable design. Experimental breeder prototypes in the United States, France, and Japan were all shut down many years ago, after decades of development and billions of dollars spent.

Vertical farms in cities can produce—profitably—hydroponically grown leafy greens, tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, and herbs, all with far less water than conventional agriculture requires. But the produce contains merely a trace of carbohydrates and hardly any protein or fat. So they cannot feed cities, especially not megacities of more than 10 million people. For that we need vast areas of cropland planted with grains, legumes, and root, sugar, and oil crops, the produce of which is to be eaten directly or fed to animals that produce meat, milk, and eggs. The world now plants such crops in 16 million square kilometers—nearly the size of South America—and more than half of the human population now lives in cities. The article in this issue acknowledges that vertical farms can’t substitute for much farmland, and that the claims made for it have been exaggerated.

Crops that get their nitrogen by fixing it from the air would largely eliminate the need for synthesizing and applying the most important plant macronutrient. Today, only legumes (and some cultivars of sugar cane) coexist with symbiotic nitrogen-fixing bacteria; imparting this symbiotic ability to staple grains would be a feat rivaling the outcome of a long evolutionary process. But symbiosis does not come free, and bacterial nitrogen fixation is not as reliable as fertilizer application. Legumes pay a considerable price for sharing their photosynthetic products with bacteria. The average yield of U.S. corn is now about 11 metric tons per hectare, and it needs about 160 kilograms of nitrogen per hectare; U.S. soybeans yield 3.5 metric tons per hectare while receiving only a small, supplemental application of about 20 kg of nitrogen per hectare. When at last we make grain crops symbiotic with nitrogen-fixing bacteria, will they maintain their high yields? And how uniformly will future engineered microbes perform in different soils and climates, and with different crops?

Meat substitutes and cultured meat are meant to reduce the environmental burdens associated with meat production. But a better, less burdensome solution would simply be to moderate our eating of meat. Good nutrition does not require annually consuming nearly double your weight in meat—100 kg per capita in some developed countries, such as the United States. Producing just 30 kg per year for 8 billion people could be done with well-managed grazing and by feeding herds the residues from crop and food processing, together with some of the enormous quantity of food that’s now wasted.

Using emitted carbon dioxide in fuel cells and burning supercritical CO2 to run turbines constitute the latest in an increasing array of techniques aimed at reducing emissions of the leading greenhouse gas. These efforts at carbon capture and storage began decades ago and have increased since 2000, but all operating projects and those under construction have an annual capacity equal to just 0.3 percent of annual emissions from stationary sources (less than 40 million metric tons compared with some 13 billion metric tons). This is another perfect illustration of the scale of the challenge. All of the carbon-capture projects now scheduled to start operating at various dates during the 2020s would not even double today’s minuscule rate of carbon capture.

Electric vehicles are the latest darling of the media, but they run into two fundamental constraints. EVs are meant to do away with automotive carbon emissions, but they must get their electricity somehow, and two-thirds of electricity worldwide still comes from fossil fuels. In 2016, electricity produced by wind and photovoltaic solar still accounted for less than 6 percent of world generation, which means that for a long time to come the average electric vehicle will remain a largely fossil-fueled machine. And by the end of 2017, worldwide cumulative EV sales just topped 3 million, which is less than 0.3 percent of the global stock of passenger cars. Even if EV sales were to grow at an impressive rate, the technology will not eliminate automotive internal combustion engines in the next 25 years. Not even close.

Battery- or fuel-cell-powered designs for small ferries and river barges (see “The Struggle to Make Diesel-Guzzling Cargo Ships Greener”) offer a transport capability orders of magnitude below what’s required to propel the container ships that maritime trade depends on. Compare these little boats with the behemoths that move containers from the manufacturing centers of East Asia to Europe and North America. The little electric vessels travel tens or hundreds of kilometers and need the propulsion power of hundreds of kilowatts to a few megawatts; the container ships travel more than 10,000 kilometers, and their diesel engines crank out 80 megawatts.

Battery-powered jetliners fall into the same category: The big plane makers have futuristic programs, but hybrid-electric designs cannot quickly replace conventional propulsion, and even if they did, they wouldn’t save vast amounts of carbon emissions. If you compare a small, battery-powered trainer with a Boeing 787 and multiply capacity (2 versus 335 people), speed (200 vs. 900 kilometers per hour) and endurance (3 vs. 17 hours), you’ll see that you need batteries capable of storing three orders of magnitude more energy for their weight to allow for all-electric intercontinental flight. Since 1950, the energy density of our best batteries has improved by less than one order of magnitude.

The human craving for novelty is insatiable, and in a small matter you can meet it in no time at all, particularly when Moore’s Law can help you. It took a single decade to come up with entirely new mobile phones. But you just can’t replicate that pace of adoption with techniques that form the structure of modern civilization—growing food, extracting energy, producing bulk materials, or providing transport on mass scales. While it is easy to extoll—and to exaggerate—the seductive promise of the new, its coming will be a complicated, gradual, and lengthy process constrained by many realities. 

This article appears in the June 2018 print issue as “It’ll Be Harder Than We Thought to Get the Carbon Out.”

A Critical Look at Claims for Green Technologies syndicated from https://jiohowweb.blogspot.com

[swissforextrading]

Three Learnings for the Era of Free Electrons

On January 30 in Dubai, eight global utility companies representing 173 million customers worldwide came together to discuss the future of energy and the role startups can play in getting there. These utilities formally launched Free Electrons, a global energy accelerator program aimed at tapping into the power of disruptive energy startups, in alliance with a global network of clean energy accelerators. The program offers a chance for energy startups to scale their solutions in new markets. Utilities will co-develop pilot projects and offer strategic investments to help the best ideas grow rapidly. swissnex San Francisco is one of the initiators of the Free Electrons program, and co-manages it together with New Energy Nexus, a global program of the California Clean Energy Fund. Laura Erickson of swissnex San Francisco shares her top three takeaways from a day spent with leaders in the global clean energy transition. 1. The clean energy disruption is well underway Transformation in the electricity sector is being driven by three main trends: digitization, decarbonization, and decentralization. The cost of solar energy is expected to be at “grid parity” – that is, as cheap, or cheaper to produce and deliver than traditional fossil energy sources, in 80% of world markets this year. That’s according to a Deutsche Bank study shared by Tony Seba from Stanford University, who predicts that conventional energy and transportation will be obsolete by 2030. Tony explained how this steep decline in the cost of renewable energy technologies is in stark contrast to the rising costs of fossil fuel production. As easily recoverable reserves are depleted worldwide, only more expensive extraction processes remain. That leaves deep sea drilling, fracking, and tar sand mining, which are only feasible if oil prices remain high. That’s a problem for producers and distributors. Despite record low costs, fossil fuel production is still happening at an unsustainable pace, even as the market for renewables is booming as costs decline. To quote science fiction author William Gibson, “the future is already here, it’s just not very evenly distributed”. 2. Electric vehicles represent the tipping point Solar and solar storage is creating a welcoming environment for new business models. That means a lot of potential to disrupt, and even displace, the energy transmission and distribution services provided by monopoly utilities – especially if you consider vehicles. Think of electric vehicles as a distributed electric grid on wheels, able to provide backup or meet peak power demands. Battery storage can meet the kind of infrequent demand that has traditionally been provided through expensive gas-fired “peaker plants” that sit inactive until periods of high demand. Building these peaker plants has, until now, provided the return on capital that investor-owned utilities offer to shareholders. Once the cost of storage is at grid-parity, however, it won’t make economic sense to build new ones. That means utilities will have a difficult case to make to regulators if they want to build one. This phenomenon further weakens the market power of utilities and increases the need for business model innovation. If these companies, which exist to keep the lights on for everyone (regardless of ability to pay), are to survive the new energy paradigm, they’ll need bold ideas. That’s why the Free Electrons program exists. Utilities must disrupt themselves — or risk being left out of the next era of energy. 3. Disrupting ourselves is essential Technology is critical to the solutions we need to decarbonize our societies. But just as crucial are changes in thinking. We must overcome inertia to embrace radical disruptions to business as usual to avert climate catastrophe. Loss aversion is the strongest bias among humankind. We are predisposed to keep what we have because we relish the security of knowing it. We’re often reluctant to give up the security of knowing for the promise – and risks – of something new. We know that renewable energy technologies will one day provide the power we need to support our societies. It could offer incredible benefits and innovation opportunities, creating new jobs and ensuring a future where energy is clean, reliable and easily accessible. However, fossil fuels have been a reliable source of energy over the last century.  An extremely complex and integrated infrastructure has been built to support it. Moving away from fossil fuels isn’t just a matter of finding replacement technologies and infrastructures. The move requires consciously shifting our mental models. They are like icebergs with only small parts visible on the surface, as explained by MIT’s Otto Scharmer during the Dubai event. He addressed the role that leadership plays in the clean energy transition: Good leadership challenges the unseen mental models that keep us producing the results nobody wants. We must uncover and confront these hidden models to create radical change at scale. Challenging our own assumptions and patterns of thought is the work of transformational leadership. But it’s also the juice that powers entrepreneurship and the drive to create something new and better, to create true value. With the Free Electrons global energy accelerator program, we’re creating value for businesses in the energy sector by aligning startups with innovative solutions with utilities with resources and a global customer base to scale those solutions. We’ll be creating win-win solutions that ensure a livable planet for us all. We want to find the world’s best energy startups! If you know one, tell them to apply to the Free Electrons global energy accelerator. Applications are open until February 28th. http://freelectrons.co/apply/ More on the Dubai Launch of Free Electrons Global Energy Accelerator:     Share https://nextrends.swissnexsanfrancisco.org/three-learnings-for-the-era-of-free-electrons/ (Source of the original content)