Renewable Energy Storage

Environmental & Science Education, STEM, Sustainability, Global Change, Climate Change

Ed Hessler

Sabine Hossenfelder tackles a topic that is important but one that we pay little attention to: energy storage from renewables.

She writes that she hesitated "to do a video about energy storage because in all honesty it doesn't sound particularly captivating...But I changed my mind when I learned the technical term for a cloudy and windless day. Dunkelflaute. That's a German compound noun: 'dunkel' means 'dark' and 'flaute' means 'lull.'"  And then she interjects a little humor, writing "so basically I made an entire video just to have an excuse to tell you this. But while you're here we might as well talk about the problem with dunkelflaute..." (italics mine).

She discusses the most talked about methods but devotes some time to "a few fun ones" too. 

Again we are reminded that "the difficulty of finding good energy storage technologies drives home just how handy fossil fuels are" and provides some handy comparisons. She also discuss whether storage helps with the carbon footprint. It seems that "it all depends" on how it is used. She closes with three things she learned from doing this video.

As usual, I point you to her blog where you can read and watch or click on the link to her YouTube Channel where you have one option unless you are a subscriber: watch.. It is another long effort, 20 m but worth it.