Flow batteries: The solution to T.O.’s energy woes?
A curious commentary appeared in my own newspaper, the Toronto Star, recently that I thought was worth posting here. It was written by a member of Canada’s Green Party, and his argument is that massive flow batteries — with frequent attention drawn to Vancouver-based VRB Power — could be used today to help Toronto with its energy bottleneck. One of the problems with Toronto is that we’ve come to depend too much on energy generation located outside the city, and drawing that power into the city during peak times puts a major stress on transmission infrastructure. This includes imported power. As one provincial bureaucrat told me, Canada’s largest city is “living off too many extension cords.” This situation will only be made worse as more coal plants are shut down, which is why there’s an effort underway to build natural gas plants within city limits — four are envisioned at last count.
The author of this article suggests that flow batteries — either one massive one or several not-so-massive ones — should be located in strategic spots throughout the city where electricity is most needed or where we have transmission bottlenecks. The batteries could store cheap energy drawn from the grid during non-peak times, and during more expensive peak times could be put into service to take pressure off the grid and the transmission infrastructure. It’s an interesting approach to shaving peaks and levelling loads, and not the first time I’ve heard about it. Problem is flow batteries of this size are still highly experimental, and utilities are averse to taking risks. So while the technology might be right, it will be a few years until it matures enough to convince Toronto Hydro to give it a shot. That said, they should be at least establishing dialogue with a company such as VRB and kicking the tires.
BTW: This experiment with storage is actually being done just outside of Toronto using a different type of battery technology. I can’t report on the details just yet, but should have more information later next month. Very exciting stuff, actually.
Tyler Hamilton is editor-in-chief of Corporate Knights magazine and a business columnist for the Toronto Star, Canada's largest daily newspaper. In addition to this Clean Break blog, Tyler writes a weekly column of the same name that discusses trends, happenings and innovators in the clean technology and green energy market. This blog is a personal project started in April 2005. It is not an official blog of the newspaper.
April 14th, 2006 at 7:10 pm
Unfortunately, the St. Lawrence Forum where we were supposed to talk intelligently about alternatives to new gas-fired generators turned into a disdain-inducing whine session about 250MW versus 550MW – conservation or death.
Nobody from OPG or the Ontario government showed up so poor Jack Gibbons had to defend a clean power station against nauseating antics from locals.
It was mildly irritating until one questioner pulled the “wait while I draw on my puffer because I have asthma due to electricity generation” and then it was just plain dumb.
Thankfully, there were some intelligent people in the audience and the last question/comment brought things back to reality: coal is bad!
It is also a bit of a shame that the concept of flow batteries (VRB or other) doesn’t get properly examined by those who are capable. The technology is Canadian (mostly) and offers some real advantages for distributed storage of electricity. Maybe Rona Ambrose and the Conservatives can spend some of the money saved by muzzling scientists to invest in technology and innovation for a cleaner Canada.