Grid scale storage within reach?

[sensij]

So let's wait & see if a workable device presents itself.

Where can I put down $1000 to pre-order one?

[Sunking]

Where can I put down $1000 to pre-order one?

Another happy PT Barnum Customer.

[jflorey2]

So let's wait & see if a workable device presents itself.

OK! You are welcome to join us in waiting! I have gotten quite good at it. (Well, waiting for that and the really cheap 40% efficient solar panel, the reversible fuel cell, the lithium ion battery with 10x the storage capacity etc etc.)

[easye]

Sunking. Hater of everything. Labeler of any who oppose. Lonely existence if you ask me. Common everyone, lets just give up and bring on the nuke plants. Those have not improved have they? Oh wait you like the new ones SK? Blasphemy. What? solar and wind have improved and gotten cheaper? NO WAY! It's just not possible that battery tech can get any better right SK? Lets all give up and quit. This is as good as it gets.

[Sunking]

Sunking. Hater of everything. Labeler of any who oppose. Lonely existence if you ask me. Common everyone, lets just give up and bring on the nuke plants. Those have not improved have they? Oh wait you like the new ones SK? Blasphemy. What? solar and wind have improved and gotten cheaper? NO WAY! It's just not possible that battery tech can get any better right SK? Lets all give up and quit. This is as good as it gets.

Go play with yourself.

[easye]

Go play with yourself.

another mature, helpful, well thought out answer. Just what I expect.

[DanKegel]

Pro tip: any time somebody claims someone has found the holy grail, you're reading a clickbait site

Well, or maybe a good site that has let down its guard and let a clickbait article through because it said DARPA or Bill Gates.

Anyway, early research is fun to read about, just remember that chances of making it into production are quite low for any particular innovation.

[SunEagle]

Sunking. Hater of everything. Labeler of any who oppose. Lonely existence if you ask me. Common everyone, lets just give up and bring on the nuke plants. Those have not improved have they? Oh wait you like the new ones SK? Blasphemy. What? solar and wind have improved and gotten cheaper? NO WAY! It's just not possible that battery tech can get any better right SK? Lets all give up and quit. This is as good as it gets.

What is wrong with nuclear power generation. At least it has zero CO2 output and has keep the lights on for a lot of people for decades.

[Sunking]

What is wrong with nuclear power generation. At least it has zero CO2 output and has keep the lights on for a lot of people for decades.

Not to mention over 1 million years of dirt cheap fuel right under your feet that pays good long term careers for a hundred generation to come. .

[DanKegel]

What is wrong with nuclear power generation. At least it has zero CO2 output and has keep the lights on for a lot of people for decades.

Oh, c'mon, you have to at least nod to the larger nuclear power plant failures, which are at the very least extremely expensive.
Catastrophic events like Fukushima, Chernobyl, or Three Mile Island, or even just reactor failures like San Onofre, are large on peoples' minds.

Fear of another Chernobyl is what led Europe to embrace solar and wind energy with such vigor.

That said, I sure would like to keep some of our current plants online. Economics aren't working out for them at the moment, but maybe if there were a carbon tax, they'd be more competitive.

[J.P.M.]

OK! You are welcome to join us in waiting! I have gotten quite good at it. (Well, waiting for that and the really cheap 40% efficient solar panel, the reversible fuel cell, the lithium ion battery with 10x the storage capacity etc etc.)

I've been there for years explaining why perpetual motion machines won't work. The point was, a working verification is better than a lot of press.

[jflorey2]

Oh, c'mon, you have to at least nod to the larger nuclear power plant failures, which are at the very least extremely expensive.
Catastrophic events like Fukushima, Chernobyl, or Three Mile Island, or even just reactor failures like San Onofre, are large on peoples' minds.

Yep. And yet the people killed by coal or natural gas are pretty much ignored, because they are not very exciting and don't sell advertising dollars.

Fear of another Chernobyl is what led Europe to embrace solar and wind energy with such vigor.

Irrational fear does indeed drive a lot of poor decisions.

[Sunking]

Yep. And yet the people killed by coal or natural gas are pretty much ignored, because they are not very exciting and don't sell advertising dollars.

Yet not one single fatailty in the USA.

Chernobyl was no accident, just plain stupidity. Let's see what happens when we turn off the cooling system. BOOM!

[inetdog]

Yet not one single fatailty in the USA.

Chernobyl was no accident, just plain stupidity. Let's see what happens when we turn off the cooling system. BOOM!

It was a little more complicated than that. Turning off the cooling system was survivable. What caused the massive excursion, as I recall, was turning it back on full force all at once when they realized they were in trouble.
So stupidity plus panic.

[J.P.M.]

Oh, c'mon, you have to at least nod to the larger nuclear power plant failures, which are at the very least extremely expensive.
Catastrophic events like Fukushima, Chernobyl, or Three Mile Island, or even just reactor failures like San Onofre, are large on peoples' minds.

Fear of another Chernobyl is what led Europe to embrace solar and wind energy with such vigor.

That said, I sure would like to keep some of our current plants online. Economics aren't working out for them at the moment, but maybe if there were a carbon tax, they'd be more competitive.

I'm not a big fan of nuclear power, but the failure at San Onofre had nothing to do with reactor design as such. For anyone interested, the San Onofre failure was caused, IMO, by people attempting design/engineering out of their area of expertise and management allowing $$ to rule over safety, but the physical causes could happen anywhere. It was a problem of tube failure initiated by flow induced vibration of the tubes in first one and then the other boiler. I've seen the same/similar problem in the past in non nukes that had similar boiler designs. Basically, they tried to put 10 lbm of stuff in a 5 lbm bag, thereby decreasing the available flow area and thus increasing the fluid velocity, then compounding the error by increased the flow rate further to increase output while keeping the same footprint, the available space being mostly fixed. They gambled and lost. I spent more than a few years studying and learning ways to minimize the probability of damage from flow induced vibration in heat exchangers. This was tube fretting at the support plates (the baffles) and collision damage between and among tubes. Sometimes it can sound like pump cavitation. If it's very bad, it'll buzz. An associated cause and perhaps initiation of failure was probably the fool's solution of increasing the tube support length to deal with (that is, to reduce) the mentioned increased fluid velocity. The increase in span unsupported length lowered the nat. frequency of the tubes, although I don't think the redacted report mentioned it.