Comments on: Duke Energy solar storage pilot worthy of replication

By: Nothing in Canada?

Nothing in Canada? — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 18:10:32 +0000

Are there any Canadian battery companies that have a competitive product? Is Canada going to import our batteries forever? Why?

I see Chinese and Japanese name batteries for sale, cheap. They probably won’t last, but hard to compete with when every supplier is selling them, and the premium quality product always costs more.

I want to see an environmentally inert battery, where if you have a leak, there is no toxic concern.

Another concern I have is that the way the technology is changing. Investing now in a rack of expensive batteries may not be cost effective when next year new ones are twice as powerful and half the price, and nobody wants your old ones..

Here is a Canadian alt-energy store selling 2 Volt 1725 Amp-Hr for a mere $759 each, or 2V 2100 Amp-Hr @ 72 Hr Rate sealed no maintenance for $1,555 each. Depending on the size of your house and power draw you might need a rack of them to store enough to last 24 hours or more. They show 12 batteries in the pictures, which is about right for a medium sized home with typical loads.

You will still need a source of power to charge the batteries – the grid or a generator (bio-diesel/pedal powered) of some sort, for the cloudy days with no wind. Or you lose charge, you’re not supposed to discharge these batteries much below 50%.

By: Envirowatcher

Envirowatcher — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 21:20:53 +0000

Wow. If this pans out, costs are as presented AND if there are environmentally accepable ways to dispose of or recycle storage batteries, this could be a winner. Reasonable cost storage can make for major evolutional changes in both grid design and renewable power benefits. Anxious to learn more.

By: Duke Testing Out a Grid-Scale Battery | BNET Energy Blog | BNET

Duke Testing Out a Grid-Scale Battery | BNET Energy Blog | BNET — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 12:10:04 +0000

[...] company that made the battery is Premium Power, according to Toronto Star reporter Tyler Cowen, who has been tracking the startup for some time. And since Duke reportedly put $100 million toward [...]

By: Michael

Michael — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 03:01:41 +0000

I have a hard time believing Epcor is the buyer. They seem focused in spinning off their generation assets into a new private company called “Capital Power”. The company is short in funds and hope to make some with an IPO. It is just my opinion but as an employee of the company I find it far fetched that they would spend that kind of money at this juncture. Plus Epcor has never been the type of company to take any type of risk that is not assured to give a return due to the fact they have to give the city of Edmonton a dividend and increase it each year.

By: Tyler

Tyler — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 17:07:47 +0000

Yeah, thanks for correcting.

It has a power capacity of 500 kilowatts, with up to 2.8 megawatt-hours of energy storage. Put another way, it can supply 1 megawatt for almost three hours or 500 kilowatts for almost six hours.

By: StephenB

StephenB — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 17:03:37 +0000

“It stores up to 500 kilowatts”. Power can never be stored. Energy can. Perhaps you meant 500 kilowatt-hours?

One watt = one joule per second. A joule is a measure of energy.