Posted on 08/29/2024 12:25:26 AM PDT by Jonty30
Brenmiller Energy’s boxes of hot rocks are being deployed to turn electricity into steam heat, boost campus heat-and-power systems, and make power plants more efficient.
Doron Brenmiller, co-founder of Brenmiller Energy, knows all about the useful things hot rocks can do.
Over the past 12 years, the Israel-based manufacturer of thermal energy storage systems has evolved from producing heat batteries for a specific purpose — solar-thermal power plants — to heat batteries for a much wider range of applications.
Brenmiller Energy’s bGen systems, which use crushed rock as an energy-storage medium, are now being deployed to turn cheap electricity into heat for hospitals and food and beverage processing plants. They’re boosting the efficiency of cogeneration plants that produce electricity and heat at college campus buildings. And they’re being installed to store excess heat from the steam driving fossil-gas-fired power plants to help them more efficiently balance the ups and downs of increasingly renewable-powered grids.
That's a very good efficiency, I believe. I'm not certain of the limitations of this technology, but it anything that doesn't use lithium-ion is very good.
For me, this is where renewables are useful, as passive energy generators for storing energy and not for immediate energy use.
Rondo [USA] heat battery
https://rondo.com/how-it-works
Nothing is 100% efficiency, but if it can get to the high 90%, that’s awesome.
This is something that you could build for your farm or house to keep the barn or house warm instead of the grid.
From the website:
RHB100
Storage: 100 MWh
Discharge: 7 MWt
Charge: Up to 20MWac
Heat Delivered: Continuously 24/7
Emissions: Zero
Not exactly sized for farm or house ...
From the description, maybe possible to heat tons of bricks for a large farm?
This is something that you could build for your farm or house to keep the barn or house warm instead of the grid.
____________________________
The soapstone lined wood heaters have for decades recognized the value of capturing high heat output to later release it to provide a more uniform and steady supply of heat in the home.
https://fireandsaw.com/best-soapstone-wood-stoves/
Agreed. Even though the headline says “batteries” and the units in the article are of electrical power, not heat energy, the applications of the device seemed more for later providing heat instead of later providing electricity.
Or buy the same rocks this company uses, if they are more efficient than bricks.
This is the most thermodynamically stupid things I’ve seen in a long time. Electricity and a turning shaft are the highest value energy modes. Turning one of those into low level heat, a low value energy, without doing something more useful on the way is damn near criminal.
I’m no engineer, but it seems like pairing these with nuclear electric power would be very low cost and efficient.
“This is the most thermodynamically stupid things I’ve seen in a long time.”
I agree. ALL Heat pumps EASILY beat 100% efficiency (in all but very cold conditions) if you consider define efficiency as Heat Out (in Watts) divided by Electricity In (also in Watts). They do this by removing heat from the air and dumping it outside, rather than simply turning the electricity into heat.
For example, this Heat Pump Water Heater (essentially what we’re looking at here) claims an efficiency of 450% (or more) - on the high end, but probably true, at least during 70 degree days.
The REAL QUESTION when you read these articles is whether these new technologies appear to offer enough ‘benefit’ to fool Congress, or the White House, well enough to get funding (obviously a bit of ‘lobbying’ helps smooth the process)...as that’s all they offer (think Solyndra).
There is amazing stupidity in governments for this sort of nonsense. And in voting populations.
In short, I think you’ve nailed it with your last paragraph.
Absolutely. And ever try to keep a bunch of rocks hot to 1500 degrees? Not so easy, unless you have a volcano that you can tap into. This is among the SILLIEST ideas that I’ve seen yet.
Moving rocks around takes a lot of diesel fuel and a lot of carbon.
More nuclear power, if you want carbon free electricity, and natural gas generators to fill in the peak load.
Solar and wind and hot rocks are children’s toys.
Maybe, but once installed do you save enough money to pay for the installation? If so, then it’s worth doing.
The carbon is a non-issue with me, but you might be able to save enough on carbon to pay for that as well over the long-term.
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