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This is ridiculous.
I'm charging right now my EV from a 14 kWh 16S LFP pack which costed me $1400 tax paid and delivered.
LFP properly managed will do minimum 3000 cycles, so that's 42 MWh for $1400 which gives $34 per MWh out of the battery.
Note: 5kW 48V inverter cost $500.
And these systems are way larger, more dangerous (wind) and not as efficient as magnetic bearing flywheels. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flywheel_energy_storage
Yeah, if you do the math, it turns out that you need impractically large weights lifted to unreasonable height. Like, suppose you’re lifting 100 ton weight 100 meters high. That’s a rather large and heavyweight system. How much energy you can store this way? Less than $5 worth of electricity, as it turn out. This is basically the same as pumped water storage, but instead of immense amount of water you can pump betwee…
This is a clever system. I remember reading about a similar system in Australia that used excess solar power to lift giant concrete bricks, and then these bricks were lowered to the ground in the evenings to drive generators. Not sure if this is the same one I read about, but it's the same concept: https://energyvault.com/
These guys “solve” the wind and control problem by digging a 300m deep pipe for the weights.
But looking at the size of the project, I have a hard time believing this is viable.
Stopped reading at a total cost of more than $300 per MWh for batteries. Quick back-of-the-napkin calculation: Car batteries come in at less than $100/KWh. They're good for at least 1000 cycles at 80% capacity. That gives us at least 0.8MWh for a 100$ investment. It's very, very unlikely that initial construction of the site and operational costs more than triple that price.
It's crazy how little we understand about gravity if you think about it. It's a perpetual energy source right in front of us, but we never really think about it, and can barely offer a basic explanation as to what powers it. It even impacts time itself[1] for christ sake. I think better understanding gravity is the solution to all human energy needs. (interesting to note I have heard stories of disappeared scientists…
I was under the impression that this is an effect of force generally, nothing to do with gravity in specific.
It's crazy how little we understand about gravity if you think about it. It's a perpetual energy source right in front of us, but we never really think about it, and can barely offer a basic explanation as to what powers it. It even impacts time itself[1] for christ sake. I think better understanding gravity is the solution to all human energy needs. (interesting to note I have heard stories of disappeared scientists…
It's not. Once something has fallen down, it can't fall down again.
To draw energy from the gravitational attraction of 2 bodies, you must first separate them. That consumes energy.
On second thought, I suppose tidal energy fills the bill. Extracting that energy is really exploiting the Moon's motion, using gravity as the "conduit". Not strictly perpetual, but essentially so for our needs.
It's crazy how little we understand about gravity if you think about it. It's a perpetual energy source right in front of us, but we never really think about it, and can barely offer a basic explanation as to what powers it. It even impacts time itself[1] for christ sake. I think better understanding gravity is the solution to all human energy needs. (interesting to note I have heard stories of disappeared scientists…
We understand most things about it
> It's a perpetual energy source right in front of us,
No it's not. It's a good way to store energy but in no way is a source.
> and can barely offer a basic explanation as to what powers it
It's not something that has power. It's a consequence of entropy.
> It even impacts time itself
You sound surprised by this? Given relativity it would be more surprising if it didn't.