From pv magazine France
Madagascar-based renewable energy company Filatex has agreed to invest €10 million in Energiestro, a French start-up specializing in the development of a storage technology for residential PV based on a flywheel system based on concrete.
Filatex and Energiestro have also signed a partnership agreement to deploy the storage solution in Madagascar and Mauritius, with the aim of pursuing an international development strategy in the renewable energy sector.
The proposed solution consists of a hollow or solid cylinder that is rotated around an axis and connected to an electric motor and generator. The flywheel system is able to store electricity by converting it into kinetic energy using the motor and the flywheel rotates at such a high speed that the electrical power is transformed into mechanical power.
The device is claimed to have a lifetime of one million cycles, good resistance to high temperatures, a carbon footprint of 10g of CO2 per kWh. The flywheel has a diameter of one meter and weighs three tons, and can be placed in the garden of a private house. The system capacity should be increased, initially, to 20 kWh, and then 50 kWh, to eventually reach 24 hours of storage.
According to French financial newspaper LesEchos, Energiestro will begin production of the storage systems this year and the first products should be tested by French companies EDF, Engie, and Voltalia.
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This seems like an excellent concept. It would be even better if the use of concrete was replaced with earth, hardcore or water. The concrete is only used for mass, and could be replaced with a much cheaper, more sustainable material to do the same job.
1 million cycles does not sound like much, could that have been a billion? What is the rpm?
I really like the concept. Only improvement would be to use materials needed to be removed from the planet (recycling) instead of adding more waste for the future to deal with.
This would make it a big WIN WIN.
50kWh for 24h? That’s a rare day where I live. To cover each 24h period throughout the year, I’d need a 250kWh capacity, mostly due to hot summers and air conditioning.
That would be 5 x 1 m diameter cylinders. Unless they can be attacked vertically, I haven’t the real-estate. I doubt I have the real-estate for the PV or wind generation to charge the cylinders.
Going off grid surely seems like a pipe dream (and I despise my electrical grid). It is within reason (though costly) to replace electrical grid with natural gas grid using a whole house generator, but providing 100% power with free local fuels (like wind & sunlight) is a long way off, at least for me.
These solutions should be marketed as grid-use-reduction tools, or, as in this case, 3rd world improvements. I wonder if 3rd world demand could sustain this though.
Very interesting tech. But also a very risky investment.
I red this kind of convertion may be arround thirty years back,that is during non peak hours ,the acces power produced is to be converted in to kinatich through very heavy flywheel ,but it was proposed only for very heavy duty use ,not for domestic use,I am very happy to know by this new concept even be used for domestic purpose,this could be game changer in storing energy.