'Freeze-thaw battery' stores electricity long-term for seasonal release
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Re: 'Freeze-thaw battery' stores electricity long-term for seasonal release
#2This is pretty sweet!
There isn't enough information about larger/heavier but greener battery technology that would be suitable for grid/home storage without the environmental costs associated with the rare earth stuff needed for transportation.
Re: 'Freeze-thaw battery' stores electricity long-term for seasonal release
#3[deleted]
Re: 'Freeze-thaw battery' stores electricity long-term for seasonal release
#4Just realized that with a battery intended for seasonal storage you only get one cycle per year so for the same ROI as a battery that cycles weekly or daily it has to be much cheaper per kwh of capacity. OTOH it only needs to last for like 50 cycles.
Re: 'Freeze-thaw battery' stores electricity long-term for seasonal release
#5"The freeze-thaw phenomenon is possible because the battery’s electrolyte is molten salt - a molecular cousin of ordinary table salt. The material is liquid at higher temperatures but solid at room temperature. The freeze-thaw battery was shown to retain 92 per cent of its capacity over 12 weeks."
Any relation between this and 'sodium-ion' battery companies like the recently acquired Faradion? (see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2PmRT3akGk )
Re: 'Freeze-thaw battery' stores electricity long-term for seasonal release
#6Just realized that with a battery intended for seasonal storage you only get one cycle per year so for the same ROI as a battery that cycles weekly or daily it has to be much cheaper per kwh of capacity. OTOH it only needs to last for like 50 cycles.
I wonder what the napkin math is vs something like methane synthesis.
Re: 'Freeze-thaw battery' stores electricity long-term for seasonal release
#7It doesn't sound like the improvement of cost is enough the justify using it only for few cycles a year as the title says rather than every other day. That said, I see nothing in this article saying why it would be limited to seasonal release, I'm guessing it just has a lower self-discharge.
The title made me thought of an idea my father had, for which I'm still totally ambivalent:
Freeze water in the cellar (speaking of like 30m^3) using thermal pomp during winter to heat house and when electricity costs little, and use that ice in summer to cool down the house. I didn't run the numbers, but I'd guess that if it was even remotely not a pure energy loss some other people would have already proposed such things.
Re: 'Freeze-thaw battery' stores electricity long-term for seasonal release
#8> The battery’s theoretical energy density is 260 watt-hours per kilogram
Makes me wonder how big a battery would need to be to handle all of the overwinter energy demands of some densely-populated US states.
Re: 'Freeze-thaw battery' stores electricity long-term for seasonal release
#9It doesn't sound like the improvement of cost is enough the justify using it only for few cycles a year as the title says rather than every other day. That said, I see nothing in this article saying why it would be limited to seasonal release, I'm guessing it just has a lower self-discharge. The title made me thought of an idea my father had, for which I'm still totally ambivalent: Freeze water in the cellar (speakin…
There's a few large building air conditioning units that do exactly this. Ice Bear was one brand name I think.
Re: 'Freeze-thaw battery' stores electricity long-term for seasonal release
#10It doesn't sound like the improvement of cost is enough the justify using it only for few cycles a year as the title says rather than every other day. That said, I see nothing in this article saying why it would be limited to seasonal release, I'm guessing it just has a lower self-discharge. The title made me thought of an idea my father had, for which I'm still totally ambivalent: Freeze water in the cellar (speakin…
> Freeze water in the cellar (speaking of like 30m^3) using thermal pomp during winter to heat house and when electricity costs little, and use that ice in summer to cool down the house.
Unless I misunderstood, the Toronto Zoo has or had such a system setup for one or more of the food pavilions.
What's interesting about this is that the storage grows with the volume (n^3), but the heat/cold loss grows with the surface area (n^2). So you're ability to 'store cold' gets better as you get bigger.
Just the same, you could also use it backwards in the winter time. On hot, sunny days at the end of the summer, warm up the water stored.