Live data from Hacker News

Ditch the Batteries: Off-Grid Compressed Air Energy Storage (2018)

lowtechmagazine.com

71–80 of 95 posts

Re: Ditch the Batteries: Off-Grid Compressed Air Energy Storage (2018)

#71
Compressed air storage really begins to make sense when the tank is deep underground, or deep underwater, so you don't need an overbuilt pressure vessel.

The very good idea of floating solar panels on a reservoir (cool panels are more efficient, and keeping them clean is cheap!) raises the question of what to do with excess power generated in the daytime. One alternative would be to pump water up out of another reservoir downstream, but there might not be one. So, just put a big air bladder on the bottom of the reservoir and pump air in.

Same applies for offshore wind power.

About half the energy you put into a pressure vessel becomes heat that you would not get back, under water. (But rock is an excellent insulator.) With enough spare water, you can draw almost the same amount of heat back in on discharge. Or, you might have a use for cold air.

Re: Ditch the Batteries: Off-Grid Compressed Air Energy Storage (2018)

#72

I'm not a fan of this personally. Compressed air is dangerous. A full tank is basically a bomb. While we have the technology to make this safe, it has to be regularly inspected. If your homeowner slacks on the inspections they could come home one day to discover their energy storage has turned itself into a crater and flattened all nearby structures. One thing to consider is that the heat generated by compressing the…

All energy storage is some kind of bomb. We just go on with our life because they dont usually go off. Just search the news for LPG explosions and see how devastating it is. Even our cars run on explosions.

Had to explain to my nephew that explosions are life. The sun is an explosion or a bunch of them. His mind was similarly blown.

Re: Ditch the Batteries: Off-Grid Compressed Air Energy Storage (2018)

#73

I'm not a fan of this personally. Compressed air is dangerous. A full tank is basically a bomb. While we have the technology to make this safe, it has to be regularly inspected. If your homeowner slacks on the inspections they could come home one day to discover their energy storage has turned itself into a crater and flattened all nearby structures. One thing to consider is that the heat generated by compressing the…

How is compressed air any different from houses with large natural gas tanks? My father in law bought a house with some property and no gas like. The tank is like 20+ years old and it’s filled every few years.

Re: Ditch the Batteries: Off-Grid Compressed Air Energy Storage (2018)

#74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All energy storage is some kind of bomb. We just go on with our life because they dont usually go off. Just search the news for LPG explosions and see how devastating it is. Even our cars run on explosions.

Had to explain to my nephew that explosions are life. The sun is an explosion or a bunch of them. His mind was similarly blown.

Yeah forgot about the sun. It takes 8 minutes for light to travel from sun to earth. If something weird happen to it, it will take us 8minutes before we see it.

Re: Ditch the Batteries: Off-Grid Compressed Air Energy Storage (2018)

#75

360 Wh for 18 cubic meters? Is this a joke? That is indeed the volume of a small room. You need nearly 40 of them, the volume of a large house, to give the equivalent energy storage of one 13.5 kWh Tesla Powerwall.

You stopped reading too soon: e.g. " By discharging the cylinders sequentially, the discharge time can be greatly increased, making the system comparable to lead-acid batteries in terms of energy density. Based on their experimental set-up, the researchers calculated the efficiencies for different starting pressures and numbers of cylinders. They found that 57 interconnected cylinders of 10 litre each, operating at 5…

This is by far the most efficient example from the article, and seems to make this kind of system viable for domestic use, but I question whether the numbers are true, as I've seem no follow-up studies.

Re: Ditch the Batteries: Off-Grid Compressed Air Energy Storage (2018)

#76

This article seems to assume we'd convert the compressed air to electricity, but I could think of a bunch of applications that could use mechanical air power instead. Blenders, washers, dryers, dish washers, garage door openers. Basically anything that uses a motor.

And cooling, especially in humid climates.

Re: Ditch the Batteries: Off-Grid Compressed Air Energy Storage (2018)

#77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would seem that flywheels can store a lot of energy, but due to the form of the energy storage (kinetic) it’s difficult to discharge the current quickly, so to speak. Especially compared to something like a capacitor which is designed for rapidly discharging a literal current, as opposed to the analogous metaphorical motive current in a flywheel.

The flywheels GP refers to were homopolar generators [1]. They created an impressive current pulse, and extracted almost all the kinetic energy in less than one revolution. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homopolar_generator

Huh, I thought they used an alternator like design: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compensated_pulsed_alternato...

Re: Ditch the Batteries: Off-Grid Compressed Air Energy Storage (2018)

#78
post #36

Slightly of-topic: compressed air is the preferred source of power for the tools of Amish people, since their religion doesn't allow them to use electricity or internal combustion engines. https://www.cottagecraftworks.com/home-goods/self-sufficient...

Most Amish sects do not prohibit electricity. It is not uncommon for them to have electrical devices powered by solar panels. I don't think most have anything against internal combustion engines. As your own link notes, they might use such engines to power air compressors. What concerns the Amish is being too dependent on the outside world. Tying to the regional electrical grid would make them too dependent. They are…

As a descendant of the first Amish to come to the US (now Mennonite), this is the most accurate take on the Amish and their relationship with technology that I've seen online. The Amish and Mennonite split happened because one group felt the other was becoming too progressive too quickly. The Amish are following the same trajectory as the Mennonite, just much much more slowly and cautiously. There's nuance in there, but that's basically the gist of it.

Re: Ditch the Batteries: Off-Grid Compressed Air Energy Storage (2018)

#79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This stuff cracks me up. Do they think Hashem is up there looking down, thinking "Good one guys. You got me there. I thought I had all my bases covered. I'll save you some extra latkes when you get here." Someone help me understand why some folks treat this stuff like a tax loophole.

I think the idea is more to understand, "where is the line drawn" than to find a loophole.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eruv

Re: Ditch the Batteries: Off-Grid Compressed Air Energy Storage (2018)

#80
post #21
post #2

Another cool energy storage technique is using subterranean flywheels. They'd probably require less maintenance than other similar energy storage mechanisms.

My Dad, (85 years old), recently posted an idea about using flywheels to store electricity -- it would give him a real kick if he knew people from here were taking a look at it: http://aoi.com.au/devices/KPW/

[deleted]
Post reply on HN