In some areas of the world energy production from sustainable sources such as the sun or water are difficult, if not impossible, to access. This new innovation involves using a crane and concrete blocks in a way that acts similar to a battery driven by a sophisticated software system and coming to a desert area near you.
A Swiss company has designed a system for storing energy in concrete blocks. The blocks are lifted by a crane when surplus energy is available (say, when the Sun is shining or the wind blowing) and then, when energy is needed later, allowed to fall, turning turbines to generate electricity.
The innovation in Energy Vault’s plant is not the hardware. Cranes and motors have been around for decades, and companies like ABB and Siemens have optimized them for maximum efficiency. The round-trip efficiency of the system, which is the amount of energy recovered for every unit of energy used to lift the blocks, is about 85% — comparable to lithium-ion batteries which offer up to 90%.
Pedretti’s main work as the chief technology officer has been figuring out how to design software to automate contextually relevant operations, like hooking and unhooking concrete blocks, and to counteract pendulum-like movements during the lifting and lowering of those blocks.
The storage of energy in this way isn’t new…the ARES project uses hills and heavy trains to accomplish the same thing.
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