Battery Electricity Storage being built in Scotland

[Hypnotic Chimera]

In a recent discussion we chatted about Net Zero and the need for fossil fuel to "fill in the gaps" when wind and solar weren't generating.

So how's about a massive battery storage facility that charges off solar and wind when excess is being generated:

Power for 3 million homes

 

[Vulcan]

Many will no doubt argue about the methods used to store energy but have been using pumped storage for some time.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinorwig_Power_Station

Other countries have similar systems.
Battery storage is fairly new but several countries have started to install them to help mitigate “brown outs”. I’m not sure if it’s efficient but in Germany they have trialled using excess electricity to split water into Oxygen and Hydrogen and then burning it again as needed to produce electricity.

Home battery storage as part of solar panel installations is also taking off. Not surprising really as I don’t believe suppliers pay customers a particularly good rate when they export to the grid?

The cost of Gas (used to produce electricity in the UK) seems to steadily rise whilst the cost of Solar Panels and Home batteries seems to still be going down. Efficiency also seems to be improving.

 

[Hypnotic Chimera]

Many will no doubt argue about the methods used to store energy but have been using pumped storage for some time.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinorwig_Power_Station

Other countries have similar systems.
Battery storage is fairly new but several countries have started to install them to help mitigate “brown outs”. I’m not sure if it’s efficient but in Germany they have trialled using excess electricity to split water into Oxygen and Hydrogen and then burning it again as needed to produce electricity.

Home battery storage as part of solar panel installations is also taking off. Not surprising really as I don’t believe suppliers pay customers a particularly good rate when they export to the grid?

The cost of Gas (used to produce electricity in the UK) seems to steadily rise whilst the cost of Solar Panels and Home batteries seems to still be going down. Efficiency also seems to be improving.

I'm suspicious about the cost of gas going up - and I have my suspicions that the fossil fuel industry is simply wringing the max profit that they can get away with in a potentially dying market.

Another thing that needs to be said is that concerns about "efficiency" are not that important. If the renewables "electricity generation" is free (after capital costs of installation have been paid), it doesn't really matter that much how "efficient" any storage might be in isolation, because viewed in a holistic way, as an entire system - the renewables system's overall efficiency is simply improving overall.
Battery is also an almost instantaneous release of electricity when required - whereas pumping storage take time to ramp up - (and to a certain extent so does gas power suffer from delay).

I see it as a very important step forward in the renewables sector and indeed, the entire energy sector. Now that generating costs for renewables are virtually free - we don't need to scale down generation when it's "too windy" or at "low demand" periods and can divert the excess to storage for later release. Solar can be used at night - addressing the most obvious attack against cheap and ever-reducing cost solar energy production.

I used to be a renewables sceptic. wind generators used to do more harm than good, particularly the power it took to make the cement for the anchoring base. Not so any more. I can see now that I was closed minded about the future and that the direction we ought to be headed in.

 

[Sideways]

There was a thread a while back about the new lithium battery tech developed by CATL which has very high current capacities and a lifetime of many more cycles than the technology presently used in cars and home batteries.
With innovation like this going on, large scale battery storage on the grid presumably becomes more feasible, useful and economic.

 

[Vulcan]

“Another thing that needs to be said is that concerns about "efficiency" are not that important.”

I agree up to a point. Many though keep banging on about hydrogen. If you charge a BEV directly from the grid you supposedly get 85% efficiency. If you instead use that energy to split water to produce Hydrogen, compress it, store it and then transport it to fuel a Hydrogen Fuel Cell EV efficiency drops to 35%. Burning that Hydrogen in an ICE vehicle is even worse and you still get NOx out of the tail pipe.

 

[Ozi]

Good news.

If we are ever to be independent of gas we need a lot more storage capacity, wish I knew what form that would take I'd make a fortune.

Just putting the problem in perspective for the UK not just Scotland in the last 28 days we generated just under 6 TWh from Gas and retrieved 0.19 Twh from large storage (excludes domestic storage). If I read the article you posted correctly this facility will provide up to 2 GWh per day. If I was being cynical I'd say 2 down 5998 to go but we have to start somewhere. The problem is huge but I'm not surprised to see Scotland leading the way.

 

[Ozi]

“Another thing that needs to be said is that concerns about "efficiency" are not that important.”

I agree up to a point. Many though keep banging on about hydrogen. If you charge a BEV directly from the grid you supposedly get 85% efficiency. If you instead use that energy to split water to produce Hydrogen, compress it, store it and then transport it to fuel a Hydrogen Fuel Cell EV efficiency drops to 35%. Burning that Hydrogen in an ICE vehicle is even worse and you still get NOx out of the tail pipe.

True, but cradle to grave analysis producing petrol from crude oil works out at about 3% efficiency and makes a hell of a mess while it's happening

 

[Ozi]

If we are going to use gas to generate power, and we are for some time to come it needs to be done as efficiently as possible. There has been a lot of work done in the USA of gas fed fuel cells running CHP keep hoping we may see this happening over here. We also use gas for feed stock in a lot of industries the most critical that I am aware of being fertilizer for that reason alone burning it could be one of the worst mistakes we are making.

 

[Ozi]

Good news.

If we are ever to be independent of gas we need a lot more storage capacity, wish I knew what form that would take I'd make a fortune.

Just putting the problem in perspective for the UK not just Scotland in the last 28 days we generated just under 6 TWh from Gas and retrieved 0.19 Twh from large storage (excludes domestic storage). If I read the article you posted correctly this facility will provide up to 2 GWh per day. If I was being cynical I'd say 2 down 5998 to go but we have to start somewhere. The problem is huge but I'm not surprised to see Scotland leading the way.

Sorry that should be 2 x the number of days surplus power is available per month to be compared to the 6000 GWh figure.

 

[Vulcan]

And have folks seen the cost overruns on Hinkley C. God knows how much electricity will cost to pay for this?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-68073279

 

[TRITON]

Power for 3 million homes

Aye but will it be for homes or will they use the power for industry or even put it on the market.

They use the "For Homes" on all predictions, but sometimes that feels like a bit of a buzz word to keep the public on their side.

Like the wind farms off the coast of Aberdeen. Originally that was touted as for supplying X number of homes, and now down the line its going to be sent via cables thee length of the country and over to the EU to be sold to them.
.
Seems here the homes they were referring to were European homes.

 

[Spectric]

I'm suspicious about the cost of gas going up - and I have my suspicions that the fossil fuel industry is simply wringing the max profit that they can get away with in a potentially dying market.

Simply supply and demand, if you become reliant on gas because suppliers know you have shut down your coal fired power stations then you are at their mercy. Maybe rather than gas we should use more pellets like Drax but then they require bulk transport and not just a pipe.

Another thing that needs to be said is that concerns about "efficiency" are not that important. If the renewables "electricity generation" is free (after capital costs of installation have been paid), it doesn't really matter that much how "efficient" any storage might be in isolation, because viewed in a holistic way, as an entire system - the renewables system's overall efficiency is simply improving overall.

Just like your car the cost do not stop once you have purchased it, windturbines require a lot of maintenance with the offshore ones being even more expensive to maintain due to access and the high salt content of the enviroment. Then nothing last forever, the blades being composite have to be dealt with as the Americans have found https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/30/climate/wind-turbine-recycling-climate.html

We are still in the early days of battery technology in the grand scheme of things and cannot defy physic's so we cannot create energy which means we cannot try and run before we can walk. The thing going for newer battery technologies like Lithium is a high energy density and a lower mass which is essential for say an EV or a power tool but not so important for mass storage. Has anyone even thought of an older technology like Lead acid, yes it was common on milk floats for decades but could it be used for storage ? So Lithium is 3.6 volts per cell and Lead acid only 2.2 volts per cell but Lead acid is a relativly simple construction and much cheaper. Look at the submarines that use lead acid batteries for propulsion, ie a battery weighing 140 tons with over 300 cells and delivering over 1000 kW which on land could be much larger.

been using pumped storage

Yes a great idea but is used to meet sudden demand over a short time frame rather than deliver power for longer durations.

 

[Spectric]

And have folks seen the cost overruns on Hinkley C

Yes that has just got out of control, £46 billion and rising means it can never repay the investment cost unless they can get away with charging very high cost for the electricity generated. What is even more stupid is to repeat this fiasco again at Sizewell C and whilst having no means to handle or process the spent fuel.

 

[flying haggis]

Oh the irony of building the battery storage facility at " Coalburn"