Giant flywheel project in Scotland could prevent UK blackouts • Hacker News Board

Re: Giant flywheel project in Scotland could prevent UK blackouts

#11

Post by catalogia » Mon, Jul 06, 2020, 2:39 PM UTC

Ballas wrote: post #9

catalogia wrote: post #6

Framing a flywheel as a "simulation of a turbine" is really bizarre, unless there's something quite weird about this particular flywheel that the article fails to make clear.

It is to mimic the spinning turbine generators, which themselves act as flywheels, but in this case without the turbine part. The rotational inertia gives stability in that the frequency cannot suddenly change. I thought that was quite clear from the article?

The article isn't unclear, it's just weird. Smoothing out the input power is doubtlessly the most common purpose of a flywheel, second to power storage, and both of those is what this flywheel is for too. Describing a flywheel in terms of a turbine due to turbines acting as flywheels is the part that's weird.

Re: Giant flywheel project in Scotland could prevent UK blackouts

#12

Post by Ballas » Mon, Jul 06, 2020, 2:42 PM UTC

catalogia wrote: post #11

Ballas wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is to mimic the spinning turbine generators, which themselves act as flywheels, but in this case without the turbine part. The rotational inertia gives stability in that the frequency cannot suddenly change. I thought that was quite clear from the article?

The article isn't unclear, it's just weird. Smoothing out the input power is doubtlessly the most common purpose of a flywheel, second to power storage, and both of those is what this flywheel is for too. Describing a flywheel in terms of a turbine due to turbines acting as flywheels is the part that's weird.

I guess it is referred to in that way to give the reader context as to why it is needed now.

Re: Giant flywheel project in Scotland could prevent UK blackouts

#13

Post by btbuildem » Mon, Jul 06, 2020, 2:43 PM UTC

DrBazza wrote: post #8

This is a consequence of the UK having little capacity for pumped-storage, i.e. hydro-electric. We don't really have the height, and we have "areas of outstanding natural beauty" that cannot be built in easily, so we need alternatives to store the energy. The rest of the world just builds a dam, creates a new lake, and moves on.

I would be grateful for having such strong legislation that protects the remaining swathes of nature.

Re: Giant flywheel project in Scotland could prevent UK blackouts

#14

Post by jacquesm » Mon, Jul 06, 2020, 2:43 PM UTC

_whiteCaps_ wrote: post #4

> This is the first time a project of this kind will be used anywhere in the world and ESO believes it could be a “huge step forward” in running a zero-carbon electricity grid. I'm trying to find some stats on this, because flywheel UPS aren't a new idea: https://www.finning.com/en_IE/products/new/power-systems/ele... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flywheel_storage_power_system#...

This company is quite advanced, but now focusing more on research and IP:

http://afstrinity.com/company/

I've seen a system meant for hospital ride-through that packed an amazing amount of power into a relatively small enclosure using carbon fiber wound flywheels. For short durations you can get away with this because you're only going to operate one of those. Larger installations would need multiple of those and then you need to get very serious about containment so that if one of the flywheels ever fails it doesn't set off a chain reaction.

The nice thing about the fiber would units is that when they break they self destruct completely within the enclosure. The fiber acts as energy sink by breaking up, as opposed to a steel wheel that will spit out sizeable chunks across fairly larger distances (many meters).

Another player in that market:

https://vyconenergy.com/products/ups/vdc-products/

Grid stabilization is better done using superconductors rather than with flywheels.

Re: Giant flywheel project in Scotland could prevent UK blackouts

#15

Post by DrBazza » Mon, Jul 06, 2020, 2:43 PM UTC

rcxdude wrote: post #5

BTinfinity wrote: post #2

Wasn't aware blackouts were a significant problem in the UK. Great device for moving away from fossil fuels though

They aren't particularly, but there was a fairly large one last year, and grid stability is become harder as more and more of its energy comes from renewables (as the article mentions, the grid is favoring fossil fuel power sometimes in order to keep things stable).

This might interest you:

https://www.ianvisits.co.uk/blog/2019/12/10/watch-a-power-st...

"The power plant was notable for being one of the few that could restart generating electricity without an external power to restart its generators in case of a wide-scale power-outage. This was partly due to cold-war concerns that an attack could take out London power supplies.

To be able to restart the plant, it made use of versions of jet engines based on those used on Concorde to jump start the main generators — and they were used to keep the lights on following the October 1987 storms."

Re: Giant flywheel project in Scotland could prevent UK blackouts

#16

Post by kwhitefoot » Mon, Jul 06, 2020, 2:46 PM UTC

Does anyone have any real information about this project? The Guardian article is essentially the same as the press releases on both GE's and Statkraft's web sites and says nothing about the scale of the project.

Re: Giant flywheel project in Scotland could prevent UK blackouts

#17

Post by jlmorton » Mon, Jul 06, 2020, 2:49 PM UTC

DrBazza wrote: post #8

This is a consequence of the UK having little capacity for pumped-storage, i.e. hydro-electric. We don't really have the height, and we have "areas of outstanding natural beauty" that cannot be built in easily, so we need alternatives to store the energy. The rest of the world just builds a dam, creates a new lake, and moves on.

That's a good point. But I'm not sure it's quite as simple as you make it sound to construct a dam with 2.5 million cubic meters of concrete, divert all of the water for a major drainage basin into the newly-created reservoir, and flood 500 square kilometers of land to a depth of 100 meters, and then just move on.

Re: Giant flywheel project in Scotland could prevent UK blackouts

#18

Post by MrBuddyCasino » Mon, Jul 06, 2020, 2:51 PM UTC

Those things have interesting failure modes. Will they have to be buried underground, or is this somehow a solved problem?

Re: Giant flywheel project in Scotland could prevent UK blackouts

#19

Post by happytoexplain » Mon, Jul 06, 2020, 2:52 PM UTC

DrBazza wrote: post #8

This is a consequence of the UK having little capacity for pumped-storage, i.e. hydro-electric. We don't really have the height, and we have "areas of outstanding natural beauty" that cannot be built in easily, so we need alternatives to store the energy. The rest of the world just builds a dam, creates a new lake, and moves on.

>The rest of the world just builds a dam, creates a new lake, and moves on.

Your wording implies this is better than the flywheel solution - can you elaborate for a layman?

Re: Giant flywheel project in Scotland could prevent UK blackouts

#20

Post by frobozz » Mon, Jul 06, 2020, 2:55 PM UTC

DrBazza wrote: post #8

This is a consequence of the UK having little capacity for pumped-storage, i.e. hydro-electric. We don't really have the height, and we have "areas of outstanding natural beauty" that cannot be built in easily, so we need alternatives to store the energy. The rest of the world just builds a dam, creates a new lake, and moves on.

Cofiwch Dryweryn!