The 2010 POWER-GEN International conference has warmed up Florida as temperatures are back to normal. Well almost...There were participants still with sweaters and coats listening to speakers talk about energy. Most of the conversations have been about traditional fuels as opposed to newer renewable technologies. This probably had more to do with the economy than the chilly environment. The cost of shoveling coal in a power plant is less risky than waiting to annualize your yearly revenue from a solar plant. Still, there was that feeling of interest and awe for better ways to heat or light-up our homes and factories. The spirit of finding new technologies was still flowing throughout the convention center. As I was leaving the floor for the last time, I ran into Un Hak Nah. He and a heavily laddened Doosan mate were busy collecting brochures.
 
This morning I attended a panel discussion called "Energy Storage Technologies". With increasing usage of renewable energy technologies, we will need to store this energy when the demand is low. Usually, demand is high when the sun is out, but the wind often blows at night when demand for electricity is low. This mismatch over a 24 hour period is also important for coal, natural gas and nuclear plants as well. The on and off demand causing wear and tear in fossil fuel plants as well which reduces there life expectancy. "Energy Storage" is an important factor for improving the efficiency and life of the grid. There were six speakers during this panel that provided thoughts of interest.
 
First of all, the speakers all agreed that pumped hydro and compressed air were the better storage concepts. It was Jim McDowall from Saft America Inc. that first brought up the spacial issues with energy storage. I asked the question again at the end of their discussions and Dan Rastler from Electric Power Research Institute agreed that spacial considerations were important and this is one reason why dams are no longer a growing energy source due to the real estate it covers. Dr. Michael Nakhamkin, Chief Operating Officer at Energy Storage and Power LLC also expressed that a compressed air (underground) system also took up less space. The spacial considerations with energy are important as this adds to overall cost. Mr. Babul Patel talked about thermal systems where synthetic oil transfers heat to a molton salt storage facility. He had some slides that showed a 50 megawatt (MW) plant that seem to take up as much space as a 1000MW nuclear power plant. He even commented that "cost is still an issue". It seemed after some discussion, taking into consideration the source and application of the energy, that lithium may store more energy spacially than any other system or process. 
 
One interesting discussion was made by Nick Bain, CEO from Graphite Energy. He presented a solar system build in Australia that used graphite as its energy storage. Graphite competes with molton salt as its has properties that can hold an enormous amount of heat and also conduct heat as well. He showed slides of their system at Lake Cargelligo in Australia where they produce 2.2 MW of energy with 10 tons of graphite as storage. The overall system does cover huge space but Australia has some to spare. This system may be worth considering where spacial consideration are not as important.             

To wrap the presentations, Mr. Steve Tyrer, Senior Project Manager from Bechtel Power Corporation spoke more about what we really need to focus on in the energy storage and overall energy space. When he said "We can't produce electricity from concepts and patents", I was taken back but realized that is one of the issues in the energy sector. We need to take on more risk. We need to build plants sooner and not have to wait eons for approvals from "energy departments". Mr. Tyler talked about the climate of collaboration and how we need to test early and test often. He said projects of build by people that engineer, procure and construct...this is part of the overall process of building a new energy plant that should be the most important not the approval stages. 
 
That is what is great about the POWER-GEN conference. Everyone is looking at who's got the best engineering, who's building what and how can I get involved? That's the energy we need today...that's the energy I saw in Un Hak Nah.