Slashdot Mirror
Batteries To Store Wind Energy
Roland Piquepaille writes "Scientific American reports that Xcel Energy, a Minneapolis-based utility company, has started to test a new technology to store wind energy in batteries. The company is currently trying it in a 1,100 megawatt facility of wind turbines in Southern Minnesota. The company started this effort because 'the wind doesn't always blow and, even worse, it often blows strongest when people aren't using much electricity, like late at night.' It has received a $1 million grant from Minnesota's Renewable Development Fund and the energy plant should be operational (PDF) in the first quarter of 2009. If this project is successful, the utility expects to deploy many more energy plants before 2020 to avoid more polluting energy sources."
I hope it's not 9 volt. Those are hard to find.
Some sort of cylindrical container for holding liquids one intends to imbibe?
You'd better patent that before someone else does.
1,100 megawatts, eh? Why, that's almost 1.21 gigawatts! Now we just need to come up with a flux capacitor and find an old Delorian!
The only way to tell the difference between a hamster and a gerbil is that the hamster has more white meat.
As a sailor, I'm sure your maritime experience is vast. But... do you happen to know where Minnesota is? You might want to check a map... XD
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."
Yeah, but the comments here don't make me want to kill people.
If it spins horizontally, won't it be fighting the rotation of the earth... always turning a corner so to speak. So we build a bunch of them, then the Global Slowing crowd forms and someone makes a movie no one is ever allowed to spin anything without permission from the Rotational Protection Agency... Leave them up on edge and let the chips fall where they may.
You have the right to remain sentient. If you give up the right to remain sentient, you will be elected to public office
So the obvious thing to do is to run half the windmills in reverse at off-peak times, and push the wind back so it can be used later!
Why are more utilitys not using something like what beacon power is doing.
I read that as "bacon power" and I just imagined the greasiest power plant ever.