Distributed Storage

Austrian researchers have demonstrated a chemical looping system can be retrofitted into biogas plants. It is said the new tech can produce high-purity hydrogen for fuel cells on an industrial scale. The scientists concerned said their system could produce hydrogen, on a decentralized basis, for €5/kg.

Newcastle University engineers have patented a thermal storage material that can store large amounts of renewable energy as heat for long periods. MGA Thermal is now manufacturing the thermal energy storage blocks as storage for large-scale solar systems and to repurpose coal-fired power stations.

A U.S. research team has sought to improve the way aluminum hydride is used for hydrogen storage. The material was nanoconfined in a framework that is claimed to be able to overcome the challenge represented by the thermodynamic limitation of hydrides in storing the clean fuel.

U.K. researchers have developed a battery with a photocathode made of vanadium dioxide, which is used to harvest light and store zinc ions and zinc oxide as a charge transport layer. The device showed an efficiency of around 1.2% and capacity retention of around 73% after 500 cycles.

U.S. researchers have concluded that wind and solar generation resources that were sized at 1.5 times along with three hours of energy storage would meet all but 200 hours of demand scattered throughout any given year.

An increasing share of residential solar arrays now include energy storage batteries. In part one of this two-part series, pv magazine reviewed the backup power features of batteries. In this part, costs, benefits and timing are evaluated.

The deal with the high-profile electric car company, announced today by Ganfeng, comes three days after Tesla reportedly placed an order with CATL for 45 GWh of lithium iron phosphate batteries.

H2X, a hydrogen vehicle manufacturer, has announced a deal with Gippsland Circular Economy Precinct in Australia to make a range of hydrogen-focused products. The move comes less than a week after Pure Hydrogen bought a significant stake in H2X Global.

Reports calculated that the single order would be enough to support production of 800,000 vehicles.

The Indian authorities have opened global bids to set up advanced-chemistry battery cell manufacturing units in India under the production-linked incentive scheme. Applications are open until Dec. 31, but bidders must commit to setting up a minimum of 5 GWh of capacity to qualify for the government subsidy.