Remove Cost Remove Molten Salt Remove Store Remove Universal
article thumbnail

Thermal Solar Goes Where PVs Can’t

Cars That Think

As electric utilities and policymakers seek solutions for storing and dispatching energy on demand, concentrating solar-thermal power (CSP) is once again gaining traction. Solar-thermal systems use sun-tracking mirrors to reflect sunlight onto a receiver, which contains a high-temperature fluid that stores heat. It's flexible.

article thumbnail

Thermal Solar Goes Where PVs Can’t

Cars That Think

As electric utilities and policymakers seek solutions for storing and dispatching energy on demand, concentrating solar-thermal power (CSP) is once again gaining traction. Solar-thermal systems use sun-tracking mirrors to reflect sunlight onto a receiver, which contains a high-temperature fluid that stores heat. It's flexible.

article thumbnail

BASF announces winners of the open innovation contest on energy storage

Green Car Congress

The winning concepts were: A molten air battery that uses a molten salt electrolyte at elevated temperature from Professor Stuart Licht at George Washington University. A novel rechargeable zinc battery from the research group of Professors Paul Wright and James Evans from the University of California, Berkeley.

article thumbnail

Researchers propose new aluminum–sulfur battery with molten-salt electrolyte; low-cost, rechargeable, fire-resistant, recyclable

Green Car Congress

An international team of researchers led by Quanguan Pang at Peking University and Donald Sadoway at MIT reports a bidirectional, rapidly charging aluminum–chalcogen battery operating with a molten-salt electrolyte composed of NaCl–KCl–AlCl 3. Sadoway is formally the Chief Scientific Advisor.

article thumbnail

Novel Li-metal electrode design could lead to more powerful solid-state batteries

Green Car Congress

The researchers used a high-temperature surface treatment with molten salt to produce a protective surface layer on particles of manganese- and lithium-rich metal-oxide, so the amount of oxygen loss is drastically reduced. 2019) “Gradient Li-rich oxide cathode particles immunized against oxygen release by a molten salt treatment.”

Li-ion 268
article thumbnail

ARPA-E awarding $30M to 12 hybrid solar projects; conversion and storage

Green Car Congress

Under the FOCUS program, projects will develop advanced solar converters that turn sunlight into electricity for immediate use, while also producing heat that can be stored at low cost for later use as well as innovative storage systems that accept both heat and electricity from variable solar sources. Arizona State University.

Solar 300
article thumbnail

Gravity Batteries, Green Hydrogen, and a Thorium Reactor for China

Cars That Think

No battery is perfect, however, so engineers keep pushing for new and improved ways to store those electrons. The gravity batteries described in this story lift giant weights in the air or up mine shafts to store excess electricity, releasing the weights later on to recover the stored energy.

Hydrogen 103