The Fraunhofer Institute (Germany) is developing a unique method to store renewable energy by dropping 400-ton hollow concrete spheres to the seabed, part of a project called StEnSea (Stored Energy at Sea).
The project started in 2011 and has received $4 million in investment from the US Department of Energy. Each sphere is 9 meters in diameter and acts as a giant battery: when electricity is needed, seawater flows in to turn the turbines, when there is excess electricity, the system pumps water out, re-charging the energy thanks to deep water pressure at a depth of 600–800 meters.
A full-size 3D sphere prototype will be tested off the coast of Long Beach, California in 2026. The sphere is expected to store 0.4 MWh and generate 0.5 MW of electricity, enough to power an American household for about two weeks.
In the future, scientists want to expand this technology with spheres up to 30 meters in diameter, aiming for a global energy storage capacity of up to 817,000 GWh, enough to supply electricity to about 75 million households in Europe for a year.
The initial estimated cost is $0.051/kWh, with an investment of about $177 per kWh of capacity. A system of six spheres could achieve 30 MW of capacity and 120 MWh of capacity.
Compared to traditional pumped storage hydropower, which requires two reservoirs at different elevations, StEnSea does not require land area, is easy to deploy in many places around the world , and has the potential to become a large-scale clean energy storage solution for the future.
Source: https://khoahocdoisong.vn/su-that-soc-ve-qua-cau-be-tong-400-tan-giau-duoi-day-bien-post1542373.html
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