On the surface, this looks promising. OTOH, often when you look below the surface, things aren’t what they are advertised to be. A good example is Elon Musk’s solar battery boondoggle in Australia. Large mega-batteries are difficult to implement, and very expensive to build and maintain, they also require special hookups to the grid and a fair amount of landscape. They are also a single point of failure that could take down the entire grid if it fails to switch on when needed.
However, a distributed solar battery approach right at the solar cells might be far better strategy. From the University of Texas at Austin:
Solar Energy Storage Problem May be Solved in New Single-System Technology
Generating power from the sun isn’t the problem. The technology has been there for decades. Storing that power efficiently, however, has been a challenge. Until now.
AUSTIN, Texas — Generating power from the sun isn’t the problem. The technology has been there for decades. Storing that power efficiently, however, has been a challenge.
That’s why the Department of Energy has awarded $3 million to engineering researchers at The University of Texas at Austin to overcome the Achilles’ heel of the solar power story since Day One: how to store its energy.
To date, most major solar energy systems are bulky and expensive, with inefficient storage capacity. Energy coming from existing solar power systems must be housed in storage systems outside of the generators that create the power. In other words, two separate systems are required to ensure successful operation.
But experts from UT’s Cockrell School of Engineering have developed a way to integrate solar power generation and storage into one single system, effectively reducing the cost by 50 percent. The UT project will develop the next generation of utility-scale photovoltaic inverters, also referred to as modular, multifunction, multiport and medium-voltage utility-scale silicon carbide solar inverters.
Collectively, the combined technologies are known as an M4 Inverter – their main function being the conversion of the direct current output of solar panels to medium-voltage alternating current, which eliminates the need for a bulky and expensive low-frequency transformer.
Electrical and computer engineering professor Alex Huang, who directs the Semiconductor Power Electronics Center in the Cockrell School and works with the UT Center for Electromechanics, is the lead principal investigator for this DOE-funded project. He believes the M4 Inverter will create efficiencies in a variety of ways.
“Our solution to solar energy storage not only reduces capital costs, but it also reduces the operation cost through its multifunctional capabilities,” Huang said. “These functionalities will ensure the power grids of tomorrow can host a higher percentage of solar energy. By greatly reducing the impact of the intermittence of solar energy on the grid and providing grid-governing support, the M4 Inverter provides the same resilience as any fossil-fuel-powered grid.”
One such additional functionality is the ability to provide fast frequency control, which would prevent a solar-powered grid from experiencing blackouts on days when large cloud cover might obstruct solar farming.
To achieve the level of efficiency needed to convert the solar energy to the power grid, new silicon carbide power electronics switches will be used in the M4 Inverter. The need for a bulky 60-hertz transformer is also eliminated in the M4 Inverter to further increase the efficiency and to reduce the capital and installation cost. Construction of the system will be based on the modular building block concept that further reduces manufacturing costs and provides reliable operation through a power backup. The team will partner with the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, Toshiba International, Wolfspeed and Opal-RT, as well as Argonne National Lab.
The DOE awarded $20 million in funding for nine projects to advance early-stage solar power electronics technologies. The projects chosen were deemed critical to addressing solar photovoltaic reliability challenges, lowering the cost of installing and maintaining a photovoltaic solar energy system and achieving the DOE’s goal to cut in half the cost of electricity for a solar system by 2030.
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h/t to WUWT regular, Roger Sowell
What a load of garbage! As mentioned in another comment, it looks like someone strung together a whole bunch of technical buzz words without even checking to make sure they are even related or relevant. And silicon carbide inverters??? Give me a break.
I see zero mention of anything in the article related to energy storage. I worked for a company that made inverters for wind, solar, backup and mobile applications. Inverters do not store power and there is nothing new here – the technology has been around for decades. Solar systems have always required inverters to feed power back into the grid, so what are they really doing that’s worth $3M in research funding?… Boondoggle like the title of the post says..
Project Summary: This project is developing the next-generation utility-scale photovoltaic (PV) inverter referred to as a modular, multi-function, multiport, and medium-voltage utility-scale silicon carbide solar inverter. Called the M4 Inverter, it directly converts the direct current output of solar panels to medium-voltage alternating current, eliminating the bulky and costly low-frequency transformer. The inverter also has a direct current port to interface with an additional energy storage device. The device has multiple functionalities and can be used for reactive power support, fast frequency regulation, and peak power reduction, and enables synthetic inertia to be integrated into the inverter for grid support. Taken together, these advances will enable the inverter to drastically reduce the levelized cost of energy.”
Extracting the pertinent part: The inverter also has a direct current port to interface with an additional energy storage device.
Hope this helps.
There is a clear relationship between efficiency and higher voltages when transferring power. Inverters allow that efficiency to be exploited via direct current sources and batteries.
Ohms law and watts law are the mathematical basis for this.
To make it more real, an automobile charging and staring system uses very large gauge copper wire to carry the 100 amp charging current and the 300 plus amp staring current in the small space of the car’s engine compartment.
A 20 volt solar cell producing 200 watts has a current of 200/20=10 amps. Scale that up to the current needed to provide a house and you get 8000 watts / 20 volts = 400 amps. You are not talking engine compartment sizes either. Runs of 10s to 100s of feet might be needed. The copper in the cables alone would be a large expense along with the power loss along those cables.
Raising the voltage to “midrange AC” about 1000 volts, reduces that current from 400 amps to 8000 watts / 1000 volts = 8 amps. Much less current for the same amount of power.
Not only do you save in cabling costs but you also lose less power during transmission.
” . . . critical to addressing solar photovoltaic ”
Seems there are many “critical” issues to be resolved.
Two examples:
One such is making the sun shine in high latitudes in the winter season.
Has the issue of shipping solar energy from Tucson to Fairbanks been resolved?
If you watch the science news, there is a major solar panel breakthrough every week. None of which pan out to anything.
And you would be right, except that costs have steadily declined, efficiencies have steadily improved, and capacity factors have steadily improved with better tracking systems.
Other than that, though, none of which pan out to anything.
The Hornsdale Power Reserve (often called the Tesla battery in South Australia) uses Samsung cells because they were better suited to the duty (and/or Tesla could not meet the promised delivery date).
The Australian Energy Market Operator is pleased with the battery performance as detailed here:
https://www.aemo.com.au/-/media/Files/Media_Centre/2018/Initial-operation-of-the-Hornsdale-Power-Reserve.pdf
The comparison charts on page 6 indicates the impressive response of the battery to load control commands from AEMO for frequency control.
The system in Texas still needs storage so that problem remains. There is nothing new about the inverter technology as far as I can gauge other than putting all functions into one inverter with ability to provide frequency control services for the grid. The low cost Chinese inverters use high frequency switch to reduce transformer size so that is nothing new:
https://www.banggood.com/Solar-Power-Inverter-2000W-1224V-DC-To-220V-AC-Modified-Sine-Wave-Converter-USB-p-1225632.html?rmmds=detail-top-buytogether__5&cur_warehouse=CN
That is why they do not cost much for the rated power. Efficiency is in the mid to high 90s for moderate loads in cool weather. The cooling fan lowers efficiency. Some really cheap inverters do not bother controlling the fan; they run continuously. Some of these low cost inverters can be used in strings with one master but they are not suitable for grid connection.
The idea for small or micro inverters on each solar panel for parallel strings is not new. This is commercially available technology:
http://www.spacesolar.com.au/micro-inverter/?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIiYS_7rK72wIVzYRwCh3ImwWNEAAYASAAEgIMFvD_BwE
These do not have any storage though so power fluctuates with solar energy variation.
So I figure the project is just bundling existing technology into a more comprehensive package. I could not see any point in batteries being located on a roof.
The system includes storage.
Project Summary: This project is developing the next-generation utility-scale photovoltaic (PV) inverter referred to as a modular, multi-function, multiport, and medium-voltage utility-scale silicon carbide solar inverter. Called the M4 Inverter, it directly converts the direct current output of solar panels to medium-voltage alternating current, eliminating the bulky and costly low-frequency transformer. The inverter also has a direct current port to interface with an additional energy storage device. The device has multiple functionalities and can be used for reactive power support, fast frequency regulation, and peak power reduction, and enables synthetic inertia to be integrated into the inverter for grid support. Taken together, these advances will enable the inverter to drastically reduce the levelized cost of energy.”
Extracting the pertinent part: The inverter also has a direct current port to interface with an additional energy storage device.
Hope this helps.
So it doesn’t really “include storage.” It just provides a direct current port to allow you to add storage devices if you want. In other words, if I’m reading this right, batteries are not included. (If I’m reading this wrong, please stop quoting the nonsensical project summary and give us your own summary in plain English.)
Effective storage of solar energy?
Yawn…
Give me a call when they dream up something as good as a big coal stockpile…
Even a small coal stockpile works at night!
The irony is coal is 100% natural solar energy storage. The Green blob constantly sermons us that natural is good… until it’s not.
Am I missing something? This looks like a big nothing – just a slightly more efficient inverter, to convert battery or solar DC into grid AC.
I agree. I am shocked that implementing a modern power architecture is seen as novel and worthy of a DoE grant at this stage. Am I to understand no one in the commercial solar industry called Vicor over the last 30 years?
I’m out of my league here but inverters have been common in RVs where they are critical because of the weight of solar panels. I had a panel on a trailer for 20+ years and the industry has been actively working on the system, even with frequency control because of appliance problems. They have greatly improved, but still seem to follow physical limitations. If they run an RV air conditioner it will be impressive, but I don’t see how that is possible.
“which eliminates the need for a bulky and expensive low-frequency transformer.”
Modern PWM inverters operate at much higher frequencies which require smaller and cheaper transformers. How is any of this a storage system?
“create efficiencies” “multi-functionalities”
PR techno-bable.
Sounds interesting. We will see.
So, the only thing they created was a new inverter design. One for each panel. Now, that has been done before.. Btw, these switching power supplies never use a bulky transformer as they switch at much higher frequencies than AC power (60 / 50 Hz) anyway.
Kind of like a UPS. I believe many residential inverters already provide this option.
Medium voltage is what goes down your street. To supply power to the wider grid they are still going to need a step up transformer. Current commercial inverters run about 98% efficient as do the transformers. They will be lucky if they can get a 1% improvement. I suspect that people that already design and build these things have a much higher chance of making improvements.
This is just a taxpayer funded nothing burger.
The Australian Battery a massive success? That is pure propaganda. It is power imported from Victoria and NSW that props up the unbelievably inefficient South Australian power grid. You can look at how it is performing here. https://reneweconomy.com.au/nem-watch/
At this moment of writing it is putting a massive (sarc) 27MW into the system.
Nothing whatsoever about batteries or energy storage as claimed. If they get that bit so badly wrong it makes you wonder if they even got their own names right.
I don’t see how this solves the problem with solar power. The current grid installations in Australia, supply all of 0.4% of our total power needs. Storing it for later use, does nothing for the production! All it does do, is introduce more losses into the system! But lets say there are no losses. 0.4% produced and used now, is the same as 0.4% stored and used later. But, I do notice in the article, that there is no mention of the actual storage media used? Did I miss something?
An interesting claim, “integrate solar power generation and storage into one single system” that is not substantiated by anything else in the article, followed by a non-sequitur ” effectively reducing the cost by 50 percent”.
Then we have what would seem to be the meat…
Where we learn that in fact the main issue is one of integrating an inverter. not storage, onto the panels…..
What is going on?
Well, finally a hint…
Yeah, right….now we are in a position to translate from press release to actual reality
“Noting the DOE goals of reducing renewable costs and improving its dispatchability we have a slight improvement we are working on, which is to integrate the high voltage inverters on the solar panel chips themselves. This won’t to a damned thing for storage, and it creates huge problems in synchronizing arrays of chips but with a bit of luck and a few million in grants it might actually result in a marginally better panel. It wont help- dispatch/storage at all, so we just lied about that”.
The system includes storage.
Project Summary: This project is developing the next-generation utility-scale photovoltaic (PV) inverter referred to as a modular, multi-function, multiport, and medium-voltage utility-scale silicon carbide solar inverter. Called the M4 Inverter, it directly converts the direct current output of solar panels to medium-voltage alternating current, eliminating the bulky and costly low-frequency transformer. The inverter also has a direct current port to interface with an additional energy storage device. The device has multiple functionalities and can be used for reactive power support, fast frequency regulation, and peak power reduction, and enables synthetic inertia to be integrated into the inverter for grid support. Taken together, these advances will enable the inverter to drastically reduce the levelized cost of energy.”
Extracting the pertinent part: The inverter also has a direct current port to interface with an additional energy storage device.
Hope this helps.
So in the end what this comes down to is a new, possibly slightly improved, inverter with an option to hook it up to a battery. In other words a big nothingburger.
And, of course, these solar panels are designed to do what we are all led to believe CO2 does: namely absorb solar energy and thus heat the Earth.
The basic science says that if you want to heat the Planet then plaster it with solar panels. Have a look at the Stephan-Boltzmann equation.
A good example of the weird logic of the Greenblob.
Meanwhile the solution to all these storage problems is a gas turbine and store the energy in a tank.
At last. A sane word in the midst of all this madness.
My first job was at Johannesburg electricity department. They had 2 coal fired power stations and two converted jet engines running on bog standard jet fuel they used for what they called peak lopping. They could run them up to full power in a matter of minutes and keep them running until the power stations had put another generator set on load hours later. I’m retired now, so this is nothing new. It appears that this approach is still the only practical solution to lopping peaks and thus keeping the lights on. Rather important for those mining gold 2 miles down.
Until such time as battery technology advances to the point where it can do the same job (don’t hold your breath) it is a complete waste of time and money in this application.
In my view unreliables like wind and solar are a net cost as they increase grid instability which then costs money to counter. Let them prove me wrong by building one of their pet projects that includes the peak-lopping element without taxpayer support and see how competitive they are.
I’ve no doubt the inverter technology they’ve developed may well make a bad idea slightly less bad but that doesn’t magically make it good.
Let’s see. Solar panels require glass, aluminum, copper, steel, and cement / concrete. When I see the industrial processes used to produce these materials powered by wind and solar generated electricity and solar heat I will consider that maybe, just maybe these technologies are approaching cost parity. Until then, don’t call us, we’ll call you.
M4 unit? Presumably units 1 thru 3 were not completely successful Dr Daystrom?
An inverter is not a battery.
Better quality solar power could help grid performance and realibility, which seems to be the point if the article.
If that is the case, the peksy problem of “dark” is still unsolved.
Which means consumers will still be stuck with the added expense and problems of a hybrid system.
And pollution will be more, not less.
Anthony you really need to read things before you post them, the article is gibberish and Roger Sowell’s link makes it clear that your title is incorrect.
This is not about batteries at all, it is an inverter that can perform some additional functions if connected to a separate energy storage system.
If I understand EMP correctly, then solar energy systems are significantly more vulnerable to EMP than a non-solar grid.
Anyone with a stronger physics background please comment.
I didn’t see one place where they actually say how their system will store energy. It sounds like it’s a new switch to change DC to AC, which can adjust the frequency quickly. Does that mean going from 60 cycles to 50? How would that help, and how would that prevent damage to equipment designed for 60 cycles?
The blockquote from the researcher certainly sounds like he’s trying to mislead / doubletalk his readers. Or, maybe I’m missing something.
The system includes storage.
Project Summary: This project is developing the next-generation utility-scale photovoltaic (PV) inverter referred to as a modular, multi-function, multiport, and medium-voltage utility-scale silicon carbide solar inverter. Called the M4 Inverter, it directly converts the direct current output of solar panels to medium-voltage alternating current, eliminating the bulky and costly low-frequency transformer. The inverter also has a direct current port to interface with an additional energy storage device. The device has multiple functionalities and can be used for reactive power support, fast frequency regulation, and peak power reduction, and enables synthetic inertia to be integrated into the inverter for grid support. Taken together, these advances will enable the inverter to drastically reduce the levelized cost of energy.”
Extracting the pertinent part: The inverter also has a direct current port to interface with an additional energy storage device.
Hope this helps.
Instead of repeating the same project summary over and over and expecting a different result, how about translating this technobabble for us so we can understand it, unless you don’t really understand it either.
The press release cut and pasted by Anthony Watts at the start of this thread is gibberish. The link posted by Roger Sowell (https://www.energy.gov/eere/solar/advanced-power-electronics-design-solar-applications-power-electronics) makes sense to me, as does his summary of it above.
The device being developed does not store electricity, but it can form part of a system that does.
As this device does not store electricity, all the limitations of existing forms of electricity storage remain.
The only issue I have with the device description is the bit about eliminating the need for a transformer. I don’t see any difficulty in making a inverter that outputs at any voltage you want, however the grid operates at several different voltages. This inverter seems to output at the voltage used for local distribution, which is fine if the load is close to the solar farm, but if they want to transmit the power long distances they will need to use a transformer to step it up.