The first step in wide scale deployment of Thermal Energy Storage TES and other demand side management tools is wide spread deployment of smart electric meters. Smart meters allow customers to buy power at lower cost when demand is low. There are a few people that will simply turn their A/C off when prices get high on a summer afternoon, but I think most people are like me and want to crank the A/C down and enjoy the cool during the hottest parts of the day. I will be one of the TES air... Read Full Story
Following is a clarification from Mark Glover, Trinity Thermal Systems. “It is not only how much, but when we use electricity that is important. Storage is an integral part of every manmade system we have. We have food in our pantries, fuel in our car gas tanks, and water in our water towers to meet our needs on demand. Man’s greatest machine is our mass network of electricity and grid, but it does not have storage built in. The supply and demand of electricity must perfectly balance... Read Full Story
As an energy industry professional I am becoming alarmed at the increasing cost of energy. I look at my electric bill and think this is really convenient and reasonably priced energy, but I know if we don’t get proactive, the price is going to change significantly.
I’m going to ask you to join me and get proactive and solve this problem. If you don’t provide leadership, we will all suffer.
The biggest bottleneck to maintaining low cost global electric prices is ENERGY STORAGE... Read Full Story
The following is part of a report written by: Scot M. Duncan, P.E.
The concepts discussed herein apply to any utility, state or region
facing pollution issues, power generation capacity shortages, or transmission and
distribution congestion and having the desire to improve power plant efficiency and
reduce the need to build new power plants.
There is no one silver bullet, there are many proven technologies and business models that applied
collectively or individually can... Read Full Story
Make ice when electricity is cheap. Melt the ice for air conditioning when electricity is expensive or in high demand. Pretty simple alternative to spending billions building new coal fired electric power plants.
Thermal Energy Storage, TES systems have been in use for almost a hundred years. One of the original applications was to use a small inexpensive compressor to make ice all week long and then melt all that ice to cool the sanctuary for two hours on Sunday. We have been... Read Full Story
The North American Electric Reliability Council reports that the demand for electricity is expected to rise 19 percent by 2015, or 141,000 megawatts. The problem is that generation capacity is only anticipated to grow by 6 percent.
People don’t realize how dangerously close we’re moving to not having enough capacity. Needless-to-say, the market will provide some solutions. That is, if supply and demand remain out-of-whack and natural gas prices stay high then other alternative sources of... Read Full Story
The storage of electric energy is vitally important, but often neglected for other green options. If energy storage could be deployed in sufficient quantity throughout Texas, it would eliminate the need for ALL the currently proposed power plants, and the need for many of the most polluting existing power plants. Power plants have to be built to serve short spikes in peak demand because air conditioning drives up peak demand. Thermal energy storage (TES) lowers spikes in peak demand by... Read Full Story
The old fashioned tank water heaters are one of the common forms of thermal storage. If we all go to instantaneous water heaters we will need to build (11) power plants to handle the peak energy. Do more by keeping the tank, insulate it and add a timer to turn it off during peak hours.
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This is an interesting read covering the many benefits and methods of energy storage. By the Energy Storage Council.
http://www.energystoragecouncil.org/ESC%20White%20Paper%20.pdf
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Of course when you are making any major purchase you are going to want to ensure that you are getting the very best. The same applies to this situation, when you are buying a commercial tankless water heater. To make sure that you get the best tankless water heater, there are a few things that you are going to need to be aware of first. What’s Good for the Goose May Not be Good for the Gander One of the most important things for you to know if you are looking for the best tankless water... Read Full Story
