[BipolarBob]

Oh great. If Joe Biden was in charge of the Sahara Desert, they’d run out of sand.

[D Rider]

Stores heat. Distributes engery in the form of hot water.

[RayChuang88]

We don't need instant energy for storage. What we need is cheap, large-scale energy storage in general.

[Tell It Right]

Southern California would still find a way to have power blackouts. LOL

[Vermont Lt]

If I could get a smaller size to heat my driveway to keep it clean in winter…that would be a big plus.

[alexander_busek]

This could end up taking many forms, from conventional lithium-based "big battery" installations, to flow batteries, silicon phase-change batteries, molten salt batteries, iron-air batteries, gravity batteries, carbon dioxide expansion batteries, and other more unusual ideas like buoyancy batteries.

My hearing aid is equipped with a molten salt battery.

/s

Regards,

[Pollard]

They'll figure out an unlimited power source eventually. Who says it has to be AI/machines that took over. Leftists are capable of this.

Fields of deplorables

[rfp1234]

Mauritania and Algeria will dominate the sand cartels in the future [?]

[Deaf Smith]

Linked story suggest using old mines to store heat.

The USA already has a abandoned coal mine putting out lots of heat… the burning coal mine in Centralia, Pennsylvania.

[antidemoncrat]

“A new type of battery being put to use in Finland is exploring the potential of sand as an energy storage medium”

I’ll bet China is now trying to use eminent domain to claim they own all the worlds sand.

[Paul R.]

Ameren's Taum Sauk (upper) reservoir (battery):

[Zathras]

Its not a battery.
Its a heat storage medium.
It has existed since the invention of fire.

[Sequoyah101]

The only thing renewable about renewables is how often they have to be replaced. All of it is expendable and difficult waste to deal with. It is a pipe dream insufficient to our needs.

[The Great RJ]

If I understand the article windmills and solar cells will heat this sand to 1,000F. I assume that the electricity produced would heat the sand by resistance heating. Basic laws of thermodynamics say that when energy is transferred from one state to another there is a loss of energy due to entropy. Consider using windmills. The windmill itself is probably only 30% efficient converting the wind energy to electrical energy. That electrical energy heating the sand by resistance heating...another loss of energy. The sand heating the water to make steam..more energy lost. Finally the turbines that convert mechanical energy to electricity..more energy lost. In my opinion the efficiency of this sand storage would be such that it isn’t practical.