Vistra Corp's 3000-megawatt Moss Landing energy storage facility went up in flames on Thursday, in a blaze that is expected to remain contained to the building. "There are no active fire suppression efforts going on, as the best approach, according to fire staff, is to allow the building and batteries to burn," according to a Monterey Sheriff official. Both Vistra and the county official said that all site personnel had been evacuated and no injuries were reported.

Yeah, I think massive chemical batteries for storing excess electricity to facilitate a contrived green energy market is a bad idea.

  • Rivalarrival@lemmy.todayEnglish
    3·
    3 hours ago

    Mechanical energy storage, like pumped hydro or flywheel. Thermal energy storage, like molten salt.

    Electrochemical isn’t entirely off the table either: less-volatile chemistries are available, and better containment methods can reduce risks.

    Non-electrical chemical storage methods are available: electrical energy can be used for hydrogen electrolysis, or Fischer-Tropsch hydrocarbon fuels. Fuel cells, traditional ICE generators, or export it from the electrical generation industry to the transportation industry.

    There’s also avoiding (or minimizing) the need for storage at all, with “demand shaping”. Basically, we radically overbuild solar, wind, wave, tidal, etc. Normally, that would tank energy prices and be unprofitable, but we also build out some massive, flexible demand to buy this excess power. Because they are extremely overbuilt, the minimal output from these sources during suboptimal conditions is more than enough to meet normal demands; we just shut off the flexible additional demand we added.