Excess wind energy to be stored underground for future use

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Neutral

"What?" is right. Are we expecting a big shortage of wind sometime in the future? Seeing how no one seems worried that oil will run out, I am surprised anyone would be worried about a shortage of wind.

Neutral

TRLK @ Oct 5th 2007 9:59PM

The problem is with storing the energy. Batteries just won't do. They are inefficient, have a life cycle and are expensive.

Neutral

A_lesson_in_economics @ Oct 5th 2007 10:13PM

@TRLK - whilst I agree with your observation about it all being to do with storing energy, your justifications as to why batteries are not suitable are wide of the mark. In short, there's no, and unlikely to ever be, a conventional battery technology that can store the generated output of a 268-megawatt system.

Now an *unconventional* battery system like this, or http://www.fhc.co.uk/dinorwig.htm is ideal.

BTW I've been to Dinorwig and it rocks. Quite literally. US owned as well I seem to remember.

Neutral

BigBirdUK @ Oct 5th 2007 10:15PM

...Trevor was being ironic - sorry to take the wind out of everyones sails!

Neutral

bombastinator @ Oct 6th 2007 2:10AM

@trevor

Well there is certainly a shortage of wind on days that aren't windy. So for those days you need to you can break the wind out.

It's kind of like a mountain sized bean burrito with broccoli for a sharing caring earth *smiles brightly*

Neutral

Sean O @ Oct 9th 2007 1:33AM

It's using an underground reservoir to store compressed air, which can be used later to power a turbine. The compressed air is the storage. WTF are you talking about batteries for? Are you guys blind? You don't even need to read the article to figure it out, just look at the picture.

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