this post was submitted on 09 Apr 2024
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A cubic meter of water above your roof has the storing capacity of a AAA cell. That's why you need huge, massive damms to store any significant amount of power. But unfortunately it's not flexible enough (you need mountains nearby) or dense enough.
There are already companies making thermal storage systems to store excess energy. They heat sand up to about 500 degrees when there's excess power and then convert it back to electricity or just use the heat directly for heating water or living spaces.
There's also companies (googles do nothing but link to YouTube videos) working on scaling this down to about the size of a water heater.
What about storing energy as potential energy using some high density objects. This may work.. Right?? gravitricity Check out their work.
Yes, suspended weights, also spinning flywheels, hot salt, hot sand
There's options besides pumped hydro, hydrogen and batteries
It's slithly better the more dense the material, but that's basically the same thing. You could say that depending on the location, using water is much more practical.
A much more interesting one I saw was the molten salt ones, where basically you store the energy as heat in a sealed place, and then when you need it, you use that heat to run turbines.
I don’t think it’s feasible.
https://youtu.be/XxGQgAr4OCo
Interesting concept, thanks for sharing