From the Faculty of Science – University of Copenhagen
(via Eurekalert) The Sun is a huge source of energy. In just one hour planet Earth is hit by so much sunshine that humankind could cover its energy needs for an entire year if only we knew how to harvest and save it. But storing sunshine is not trivial. Now a student at Department of Chemistry, University of Copenhagen has researched his way to a breakthrough which may prove pivotal for technologies trying to capture the energy of the sun, and saving it for a rainy day.
Anders Bo Skov has recently started studying for his Master’s degree in chemistry at University of Copenhagen. Together with his supervisor, Mogens Brøndsted Nielsen, he is publishing the paper “Towards Solar Energy Storage in the Photochromic Dihydroazulene-Vinylheptafulvene System” in the journal “Chemistry – A European Journal“.
Professor Brøndsted is in charge of “Center for Exploitation of Solar Energy” at University of Copenhagen. Here his team is attempting to develop molecules capable of harvesting and holding substantial amounts of solar energy, storing it for significant amounts of time, and releasing it on demand. Regrettably a year of research had shown them something that was taking on the shape of an irksome law of nature. As the capacity of the molecules to hold energy seemed to improve, the capacity to store it over time dropped; and vice versa.
The group is working with molecules known as the Dihydroazulene-Vinylheptafulvene system. Put very simply this stores energy by changing shape, but every time the Brøndsted group managed to design improved molecules, the molecules lost some of their ability to hold their “energy storage” shape, says professor Brøndsted.
“Regardless of what we did to prevent it, the molecules would change their shape back and release the stored energy after just an hour or two. Anders’ achievement was that he managed to double the energy density in a molecule that can hold its shape for a hundred years. Our only problem now is how we get it to release the energy again. The molecule does not seem to want to change its shape back again”, grins Mogens Brøndsted.
During his Bachelor studies Anders Bo Skov had four months to improve Brøndsted’s unstable molecule for his bachelor project. And he made it in the nick of time. Chemistry is a lot like baking. No bread is likely to come out of the oven if, for example, the flour disappears while the dough is proving. Using that analogy, Skov’s “bread” persisted in disappearing between his very hands. The molecules he was working with were that unstable.
“My chemical “recipe” demanded four synthesis steps in order to work. The first three were a piece of cake. I had them working in just a month. Getting the last step in order took me three months”, tells Skov.
Regardless of method, when you store energy there is a theoretical limit to the energy density… And then there is reality. In theory a kilogram of the right molecules could store a megajoule of energy if they were perfectly designed. With that amount of energy you can heat three liters of water from room temperature to boiling.
A kilo of Skov’s molecules can boil only 75 centiliters but it does that in just three minutes. This means that his molecules could bring to the boil 15 liters of water per hour and Skov as well as his supervisor are convinced that this is just the beginning.
“What Anders has achieved is an important breakthrough. Admittedly we do not have a good method to release the energy on demand and we should increase the energy density further still. But now we know which path to take in order to succeed”, says a visibly enthusiastic professor Mogens Brøndsted. Skov too is excited: Mostly because his molecules are sustainable on more levels than just the obvious one. Not only do they harvest sustainable solar energy. They are also completely non-toxic, he relates.
“When it comes to storing solar power our biggest competition comes from lithium ion batteries and lithium is a poisonous metal. My molecule releases neither CO2, nor any other chemical compounds while working. It is “Sunlight in-power out”. And when the molecule wears out one day it degrades to a colorant which is also found in chamomile flowers”, explains the Masters student.
Despite all the frustrations under ways, Skov has become so excited about his bachelor project that he has brought it with him into his Master’s programme. Normally Master students will start the programme by taking courses for a year, before turning to the research for their thesis. Skov on the other hand just stayed in the lab after his bachelor project. He is affiliated with the Center for Exploitation of Solar Energy in order to pursue his ideas for tweaking the sun-catcher molecule. Now he wants it to release the energy on demand. And the 25 year-old Masters student is brimming with ideas for the construction of such a compliant molecule.
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Sounds nice in theory – but I would be deeply concerned about living next to a large scale semi stable reservoir of heat.
For example, consider how much energy you would have to store, to replace a base load of 1Gw for 1 day.
The energy is 1Gw x 1 day
= 1000,000,000w x 86400s
= 8.6 x 10^13 joules of energy
By an interesting coincidence, Little Boy, the nuclear bomb which destroyed Hiroshima, released a similar magnitude of energy – 63 Terrajoules, or 6.3 x 10^13 joules.
So if your 1Gw for a day heat reservoir of molecules suddenly all decided to snap back to a stable configuration, the resulting release of heat would be indistinguishable from a 10 kiloton nuclear explosion.
At least with petrol, the fuel has to mix with oxygen to explode. With this stressed molecule storage, the release of energy appears to be possible without any additional components.
Yes, but there won’t be any radiation produced, Thank God! It will be just like a hotflash.
The experiment has only run for 3-4 billion years, given enough ink stained pieces of paper, the grand- children can be saved.
Seems a small price for someone else to pay.
Here’s another solar storage idea used for centuries: grow corn and hay and store in large wooden barns. When you want to release all that power, simply feed to horses and cattle, attach them to wagons and machinery, and set then to work.
One problem I see with the idea nowadays is that we’ve converted a lot of the best farmland into housing developments and a lot of the barns have been torn down. Only the Amish are able to make a go of it.
Some breweries already do this, and manage to make a reasonable beverage as a by-product.
I personally like the approach.
Notes these developments in the history of life and energy.
Photosynthesis, digestion and respiration, farming (really a form of extracting mineral energy from soil), mining and petroleum extraction (a form of extracting mineral /fossil fuel as stored energy in rocks-in that both minerals and oil take energy to concentrate to a level beneficial to mine).
It’s good to see a few organic chemists crawling out of the woodwork on this topic. I found this paper that shows the conversion and has a good picture of the molecules. http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/j100118a030 (kind of remenicent of some of my graduate work in that olefins are rearranging their bonds). It’s hard to think of this for large scale energy storage as it looks like a pretty low grade heat generator but it seems you could run this through a thin flat panel exposed to UV light (such as from the sun) and store the photo absorbed molecule until needed heat, then run the molecule over a catalyst to release heat while restoring the molecule it to its original state. Repeat the next day when the sun is shining. It would be interesting to see how much material you’d need to store sufficient heat to keep a modest home warm in a cold climate for 2-3 days
I can store solar energy as chemical potential energy by operating a solar cell to make a current, which I can then use for electrolysis.
Unfortunately, energy obtained in this manner is not cost competitive with alternatives already offered in the private sector.
Great, just what we need. Another means of adding the most potent green house gas to the atmosphere without the benefit of adding plant food…
“most potent greenhouse gas” = water…
Sources:
1.”Water Vapor Rules the Greenhouse System,” http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/greenhouse_data.html
2. “Climate Cycle Is Dominated by Water Cycle, Not CO2,”
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/10/07/climate-change-is-dominated-by-the-water-cycle-not-carbon-dioxide/
So…. ??
RHS,
Just a note to let you know that I am sincerely wondering what you meant, not being sarcastic or anything.
Janice
I made azulene once. As it’s name suggests, it is a fabulous blue color. Probably the most beautiful blue I’ve ever seen. But it’s a loser. Cost, difficulty of synthesis, energy density, stability, the list goes on.
“Anders’ achievement was that he managed to double the energy density in a molecule that can hold its shape for a hundred years.”
How does he know that?
tree rings
Well Janice; you take the prize for that one.
G
Well, thank you, George. (heh)
Someone a few years ago designed a light that was powered by lifting a weight and then converting that to electricity. Couldn’t you rig something like that, maybe using a pulley system to raise the weight and then when released, you could produce power on the way down, like the braking systems for cars that recharges the battery. A big weight can be easily stored.
We live in a gravity well, and I’ve heard it’s pretty deep. Except there is almost no gravity at the center, just lots of pressure.
Tim Huck
You ask
The method is called ‘pumped storage’ and is used in many places.
I think you may want to read e.g. this.
Richard
Did I not read that in Germany, a number of pumped storage facilities were being decommisioned because of green energy? I am too lazy to go look it up, but it had to do with the fact that solar and wind were being subsidized and/or the storage facilities couldn’t afford the higher rates for electricity required by the green energy regulations.
BTW, a pumped storage facility for the Hudson River near Cornwall NY was killed years ago by the greens.
As I recall they wanted to use the power from the Indian Point nuclear power plant. The rich folks didn’t want the power lines spoiling their view. They just lined up group after group to go to court, each case taking months to years to litigate. Finally, some fishermen from Massachusetts or somewhere suing over possible harm to the fishery was the final straw. The greens were learning that it doesn’t matter if you lose a lawsuit since the delay caused by the suit was often enough to kill a project.
Back then, the greens were pushing coal and oil fired power plants. Their big fear was nuclear.
Niagara’s “pumped storage” ponds uphill of the Robert Moses power plant were viciously opposed by the locals back in the 1950’s and 60’s- and that was only for a few hundred additional acres of the several total acres needed for the new lake (part of the dikes covered Indian territory granted before the 1800’s), so your observation about enviro’s opposing all energy is well-founded.
In a certain way, Germany’s “pumped storage” is actually just regular hydro across the water in Norway and Sweden conventional dams. Hydro power is instantly available to back up the minute-by-minute changes in wind power. “Chasing wind” destroys the very hot, very high pressure coal and gas turbine pressure vessels by increasing the stress changes across their 3 and 4 inch thick cast steel casings every hour. The gas turbines and generators are built to come up to a high temperature and stay there, not to be continually cycled back and forth from 1800 degrees hot to cold back to hot back to cold again and again and again.
joel
I am not aware of the pumped storage facilities closures you assert in Germany, and I would be interested to learn of them.
The main benefit of pumped storage is that it removes the very high cost of needing to operate a few power stations continuously so they can provide the minutes of peek power demand each day: the pumped storage generates during those minutes. Hence, pumped storage saves much money. As it says in the link I provided for Tim Huck
Richard
joel
May 9, 2015 at 5:16 am
“Did I not read that in Germany, a number of pumped storage facilities were being decommisioned because of green energy? I am too lazy to go look it up, but it had to do with the fact that solar and wind were being subsidized and/or the storage facilities couldn’t afford the higher rates for electricity required by the green energy regulations.”
You misremember. EON and others are pondering whether to decommission gas peaker plants – the number of hours in a year that they are used and can make their profits has dropped to a point that they are uneconomic.
http://notrickszone.com/2015/03/18/green-progress-worlds-most-efficient-gas-fired-turbines-to-get-shut-down-due-to-energiewende/#sthash.Avub6Qby.dpbs
DirkH
Thankyou. That explains the matter I wanted to know.
Richard
Tim Huck
May 8, 2015 at 10:31 pm
“A big weight can be easily stored.”
I once helped in the development of a battery pack for household overnight storage of roof mounted solar panel electricity production. Our system stored, I don’t know, 40 kWh or so. So I calculated how much water you would have to store in the attic of a 2 storey house to store the same energy as potential energy. Pumped storage on a household basis basically. So, 100 tons of water would do. A bit bulky; if you use a heavy metal, with a specific weight of 16 kg/l, you could bring the volume down to 6 cubic meters, and lift and drop the weight using some spring system as needed. Quite doable, and most definitely one of the funnier ways of storing energy.
Perhaps something like this?
https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=locomotive+energy+storage
Friends
The article says
So, the article reports that the method does not work.
The reported method merely sequesters energy and stores the energy where it cannot be used and cannot be released for use.
Of course, the method could be worse. The energy could all be released at once: this would have similar effect to a detonator releasing the energy stored in gelignite.
Fuels are stores of energy that release the energy in controlled manners and appropriate rates.
Richard
My Atmos mantle clock runs on the expansion of Ethyl Chloride. One degree of temperature change or 3mmHg barometric pressure change will keep it running for 2 days. I only touch it twice a year for DST.
I see that nobody mentioned MHD as a means of gaining electricity directly without the trip over heat. Unfortunately development of MHD generators seems to have halted for the moment.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetohydrodynamic_generator
I reckon that there would be a much better return using solar energy to make coal.
http://www.stormthecastle.com/blacksmithing/how-to-make-coal-for-your-forge.htm
Just use solar for the required energy in the process. Oh and for a 100% solar process you’ll need solar-powered chain saws too.
I love a heated exchange.
I thought Fools’ Day being over for this year. Did I miss something?
That makes me think about some sort of Fossile Fuels Day….
The Carnot Bicycle
(from the comedy series Portlandia, which makes fun of Portland, Oregon hipsters)
lololololLOLOLOLOLOLOOLOLOLOLOLOOLlolol — I — have — seen that guy! He rides in Seattle… he rides in Bellingham in San Francisco in…. he is EVERYWHERE.
Bike Man.
And here he is today. Got therapy. Out of denial about dope. Got healthy. Borrowed his Mom’s car for a couple years while he saved up….
Chevy Pick-up ad (youtube)
And he — is — BACK! (back to where he had not been since he turned 13)
There’s hope. Someday, most guys like him actually do figure it out. Yes, even YOUR son (or daughter)! Happy Mother’s Day (to all you dads who were the real mom in the home, too)!
I am tired of these articles and this debate. None of them deal with the real solar energy problems:
1. Solar energy is diffuse. No matter how you gather it you will have to build something very very big to gather industrially useful quantities of energy. How big? Square miles big.
2. The sun provides no more than 4380 hours of energy per year. Even if you have a storage system. You need to build enough capacity so that the storage system provides energy on the coldest darkest night of the year. In other words, to keep Anders Bo Skov warm in January, he will have to brew his juice in June and store it safely away for 6 months. More capital equipment.
The cost of land and fixtures alone will be unaffordable.
Now a student at Department of Chemistry, University of Copenhagen has researched his way to a breakthrough which may prove pivotal for technologies trying to capture the energy of the sun, and saving it for a rainy day.
That would be Fossil fuel then?
Jeez HC
Mediterranean hornets are using some kind of a photosynthesis mechanism to store additional energy that allows them to stay in flight longer in sunny weather. Could be interesting to find out, how they do it. Granted, hornets are not the friendliest of research subjects.
P.S. It is snowing hard outside, with lightnings. May 9th, South San Juan mountains, Colorado.
Cucumbers!
Recognized a few compounds, various hydro-carbons, dihydroazulene – C10H10, benzene rings, bromine, hydrogen cyanide, chlorine, lots of yummy stuff. Maybe a super chemist can discuss the raw materials that go into this “sounds-to-good-to-be-true” solution to a non-problem.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25847100
They are confronting “Le Châtelier’s principle”, about natural equilibrium.
For those wanting to go a little more “off grid”, how about various forms of solar and wind “vaporators” (TM StarWars) on a hill draining their product into tanks which in turn gravity feed past various types of water wheels providing various kinds of mechanical energy (keeping led lights going and 12v and 5v electronic devices charged ?). Water then keeps header tanks for toilet flushing filled then overflow goes on to ponds a hydroponic tanks where one grows fish’n’other kinds of food, then overflow goes into garden and the ground and/or stream … and/or the water tanks of your neighbours down the hill to be used the same way before finally making its way to local streams and rivers, etc. Limitless / constantly replenishing water to be found in our atmosphere ready to be harvested, used, and returned by gravity to its source. All that is needed is energy cheap enough to make its extraction worthwhile. Like the kind of cheap energy used on boats to create fresh water. IE, sun and wind. 🙂 Ah, but no use for the likes of Big Government and the UN (etc etc) if everyone was able to produce their own power and clean water, so I guess we should expect to see Max Whisson’s inventions and idea becoming mainstream any time soon. In fact, what has happened in that regard since this was published ? http://www.intmath.com/blog/environment/water-from-the-air-using-windmills-1003 Such ‘vaporators’ could be great for rural Australia. Obviously no such need for such things where there are seasonally snow covered mountains. All that energy collecting every year and then melting away to not be used particularly effectively in terms of creating energy independence.
[Yes, we know it reads like an advertisement. 8<) But you need to understand how some people feel "energy" is easily made, stored, and distributed. .mod]
The Plains Indians were off the grid, but not exactly carbon free.