Copenhagen, Denmark Sometimes, there can be too much of a good thing. Every so often, from California to Germany, there’s news of “negative electricity prices,” a peculiar side effect of global efforts to generate clean energy. Solar farms and wind turbines produce varying amounts of power based on the vagaries of the weather. So we build electrical grids to handle only the power levels we expect in a given location. But in some cases, there’s more sun or wind than expected, and these renewable energy sources pump in more power than the grid can handle. The producers of that power then have to pay customers to use up the excess electricity; otherwise, the grid would be overloaded and fail. A
Energystorageproved itself in 2017. The industry stepped up with two major high-speed deployments to resolve grid emergencies. Utility-scale projects got bigger and longer-lasting. Major international conglomerates bought up storage startups. And all the major solar developers started getting into the game. Much of the action remained at the pilot stage. But some projects showed that storage economics already make sense without subsidies, grants or other interventions -- in the right circumstances, of course. GTM will be diving deep on these themes at the Energy Storage Summit in San Francisco December 12-13. In the meantime, here's a roundup of the key developments from 2017. read the full
The used batteries from Mercedes EVs will eventually be powering your house, with the German brand rolling out a second-life program for its lithium-ion batteries to combat rival Tesla's Powerwall. With EV batteries no longer suitable for use in cars once they degrade to 80 per cent of their original capacity - a process that can take as few as eight years - the premium manufacturer is investigating ways to use these still potentially very useful power-storage devices outside of the vehicle. One solution, delivered through the Mercedes-Benz Energy company formed in 2016, is to recycle used car batteries into power storage for residential and commercial buildings. Boris von Bormann, CEO of Me
For more than a decade, it has been called the wonder material, but few know about it and very little has been done to put it to use. It is one million times thinner than a single strand of human hair and yet, it is 200 times stronger than steel and nearly transparent. Many scientists are of the opinion that Graphene could develop technology that can be further used to build extremely fast computers, bendable smartphones and for all we know, even transparent planes. Graphene is a boon for manufacturers. Graphene can be made by pressing graphite into sheets that are one atom thick. It is so thick that only a gram of the material is enough to cover an entire football field! Silicon, as is
The 2018 World Cup draw took place today! Group A: Russia, Uruguay, Egypt, Saudi Arabia Group B: Portugal, Spain, Iran, Morocco Group C: France, Peru, Denmark, Australia Group D: Argentina, Croatia, Iceland, Nigeria Group E: Brazil, Switzerland, Costa Rica, Serbia Group F: Germany, Mexico, Sweden, South Korea Group G: Belgium, England, Tunisia, Panama Group H: Poland, Colombia, Senegal, Japan
The state of South Australia announced on Friday that it had powered up the world’s biggest battery ahead of schedule: a feat already being heralded as one of this century’s first great engineering marvels and a potential solution to the country’s energy woes. The battery is the size of an American football field. It is capable of powering 30,000 homes, and its rapid deployment reflects the union of a blackout-prone state and a flashy entrepreneur, Elon Musk, the founder of Tesla Motors, who pledged to complete its construction in 100 days or do it for free. “This is history in the making,” said Jay Weatherill, the premier of South Australia. In a statement, Tesla said the completed battery
