Missing idea: the storage of solar energy is not at the point

There are numerous preconceived ideas on solar photovoltaics. Solar Terre has decided to take stock of each of them.

The storage of electricity is not new

Electricity has been kept in several ways for a long time. Here are 3 examples among traditional techniques.

• The leading lead battery was invented in 1859. More than a century has passed since she started our cars. We have seen telecommunications relay for 40 years in the desert area or in the refuges of the mountains that work completely independently thanks to a battery park.
• France has several energy transfer stations («step») which work as large -scale storage devices. They pump the water into the tanks during the «cables» periods and produce electricity using a turbine during the tip. Their production power is equivalent to that of 5 nuclear reactors.
• The French electrical system has long used the 11 million electric water heater to balance the offer and demand for electricity: at night, excess electricity of our nuclear power plants is stored in the form of hot water. This is the raison d’etre of «outside the tip» prices and the tariff signal that triggers the water heater.

New storage technologies are efficient

It is correct that the storage skills installed to date are completely insufficient to quickly switch to a 100%renewable energy mixture. The cost of traditional conservation techniques is still high and are not entirely satisfactory from an environmental point of view. But new electricity conservation technologies are changing the game. After the industrial revolution of the solar, it is the revolution of storage that takes place before our eyes. There are many new storage technologies. Among these, those who seem to deserve more attention are lithium and hydrogen batteries.

Lithium ion batteries are used exponentially and their costs decrease quickly. We can clearly see the advantages of these progress on the development of electric vehicles. But the sales of so -called fixed batteries, i.e. to keep electricity in an electrical network or directly to the consumer, have experienced a real explosion for a few years.

• On a global scale, the lithium -ion batteries market believes in the rate of 11000% per year
• Records are infanting regularly. In 2014, German energy company Wemag inaugurated the first European lithium -ion batteries in Europe batteries. Its capacity is 25 megawatheure. In July 2017, Tesla started the construction of a 5 -time lithium -ion battery park more powerful in JameMetown in Australia which will provide 30,000 houses. The batteries will be coupled to the Harnsdale wind farm managed by the French Neoen.
• In June 2017, the SEPA of the North America alliance interviewed 115 electricity distribution companies on their development projects. 72% of them said they prepared a program to distribute «behind the counter» storage solutions with their residential customers. This rate increases 80% with its professional customers.

Hydrogen, the future of electricity storage

The storage of electricity for hydrogen opens extraordinary prospects with the ability to preserve electricity for long periods, for example from summer to winter, with very few losses and minimum dimensions. This technology is based on the electrolysis of the water that transforms electricity into hydrogen and fuel cells that transforms hydrogen into electricity. The electrolysis of the water is well known: passing an electric current between two electrodes immersed in the water, the hydrogen is separated from the oxygen. Hydrogen can be stored in bottles. A fuel cell therefore allows you to produce hydrogen electricity and oxygen present in the ambient air. Areva has developed the green energy box, an electricity accumulation system that combines electroliser and a fuel cell. The first units associated with photovoltaic panels were put in service in 2012 and 2013, in Corsica and in the Var.