Santa Barbara, California-based company Advanced Rail Energy Storage (ARES) has come up with a land-based alternative that would provide grid scale energy storage using electric locomotives.

ARES recently held an open day at its R & D facility in California. Built as a proof of concept for its patented Regulation Energy Management (REM) system, the pilot plant is designed to even out intermittent power supply from a neighbouring wind farm. This facility features a pilot vehicle that weighs 12,500 lb and runs on that is 880 ft in length.

ARES is a rail-based technology that stores energy by raising the elevation of mass against the force of gravity and recovering the stored energy as the mass is returned to its original location.

Specifically, ARES energy storage technology employs a fleet of electric traction drive shuttle-trains, operating on a closed low-friction automated steel rail network to transport a field of heavy masses between two storage yards at different elevations.

ARES facilities integrate significant recent advances in motor/generator traction drives and power control technologies with proven rail technology to produce a reliable and highly capable system that approaches an 80% charge / discharge efficiency. The facility designs are highly scalable in power and energy ranging from small installations of 100MW with 200MWh of storage capacity up to large 2-3GW regional energy storage systems with 16-24GWh energy storage capacity. ARES technology does not require the use of water nor does it release noxious emissions

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zshJwVlbOeM

….. and the link.

http://revolution-green.com/2013/07/23/ares/

Interesting concept.

ARES is a rail-based technology that stores energy by raising the elevation of mass against the force of gravity and recovering the stored energy as the mass is returned to its original location

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Pfft. You haven’t told us where to buy shares.

tauto said:

ARES is a rail-based technology that stores energy by raising the elevation of mass against the force of gravity and recovering the stored energy as the mass is returned to its original location

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Pfft. You haven’t told us where to buy shares.

Use my Paypal email ….. ;)

Spiny Norman said:

Use my Paypal email ….. ;)

No chance.

this is no more than industrialised clockwork, using wind turbines to wind something up to release the power evenly

its a nice idea but impractical

wookiemeister said:

this is no more than industrialised clockwork, using wind turbines to wind something up to release the power evenly

its a nice idea but impractical

it kept time and still does.

24 GWH is about 8.64E13 J (or 86,400 GJ)

With 100 m difference in level you would need about 10 million tonnes of locomotive and dead weight to store that much energy.

It isn’t going to be cheap.

Using water seems to make more sense.

The Rev Dodgson said:

24 GWH is about 8.64E13 J (or 86,400 GJ)

With 100 m difference in level you would need about 10 million tonnes of locomotive and dead weight to store that much energy.

It isn’t going to be cheap.

Using water seems to make more sense.

water was initially used to record the passing of time.

roughbarked said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

24 GWH is about 8.64E13 J (or 86,400 GJ)

With 100 m difference in level you would need about 10 million tonnes of locomotive and dead weight to store that much energy.

It isn’t going to be cheap.

Using water seems to make more sense.

water was initially used to record the passing of time.

It has also been used to store mains electricity for the past 50 years or so (if not longer).

you’d be better off building a dam and using hydroelectric

the best idea for powering the earth would be using solar panels connected to a worldwide network

the bright side powers the dark side

you’d need to put this power grid in reliable countries that aren’t prone to “problems” you could run a powercable from Australia up through Vietnam and china into Russia and across to Europe, the other cable would run across to the berring strait and into Alaska , Canada and America. this would provide power for most of the time with a small window of the night being powered by small scale renewables.

the cable would be multiple 500KVDC the sunlight falling on Australia could easily power its neighbours

everyone would be reliant on each other to make sure power isn’t disrupted, sure someone could cut the cable in their country but then they wouldn’t have any power either and the tanks would be rolling in to reconnect the power system

roughbarked said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

24 GWH is about 8.64E13 J (or 86,400 GJ)

With 100 m difference in level you would need about 10 million tonnes of locomotive and dead weight to store that much energy.

It isn’t going to be cheap.

Using water seems to make more sense.

water was initially used to record the passing of time.

as was the sun

The Rev Dodgson said:

24 GWH is about 8.64E13 J (or 86,400 GJ)

With 100 m difference in level you would need about 10 million tonnes of locomotive and dead weight to store that much energy.

It isn’t going to be cheap.

Using water seems to make more sense.

What about the lower end of the scale they mentioned – 200 MWh storage. Can you do a quick BOTE calculation for that?

Make that 120 years or so:

“The first use of pumped storage was in the 1890s in Italy and Switzerland”

I have thought about such a system on a domestic scale, here on my block, many times.
I see two fundamental problems with it.

1) You need huge masses and elevations to store significant amounts of energy
2) When you recover energy from such a system, you must allow it to convert some potential energy to kinetic energy before you can begin to harvest it. Then when you want to stop harvesting the energy, you have to bring the moving mass to a halt again.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UalZ0rNB27k

the space sentinels live in a volcano with robots and computers and stuff

party_pants said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

24 GWH is about 8.64E13 J (or 86,400 GJ)

With 100 m difference in level you would need about 10 million tonnes of locomotive and dead weight to store that much energy.

It isn’t going to be cheap.

Using water seems to make more sense.

What about the lower end of the scale they mentioned – 200 MWh storage. Can you do a quick BOTE calculation for that?

About 80,000 tonnes

morrie said:

I have thought about such a system on a domestic scale, here on my block, many times.
I see two fundamental problems with it.

1) You need huge masses and elevations to store significant amounts of energy
2) When you recover energy from such a system, you must allow it to convert some potential energy to kinetic energy before you can begin to harvest it. Then when you want to stop harvesting the energy, you have to bring the moving mass to a halt again.

which could be a problem with huge masses of water?

roughbarked said:

morrie said:

I have thought about such a system on a domestic scale, here on my block, many times.
I see two fundamental problems with it.

1) You need huge masses and elevations to store significant amounts of energy
2) When you recover energy from such a system, you must allow it to convert some potential energy to kinetic energy before you can begin to harvest it. Then when you want to stop harvesting the energy, you have to bring the moving mass to a halt again.

which could be a problem with huge masses of water?

With water, you don’t have the entire mass in motion. Just a small, controlled portion of it.
The mass and elevation calculations remain the same, but with water the harvesting is much, much, much easier.

The Rev Dodgson said:

24 GWH is about 8.64E13 J (or 86,400 GJ)

With 100 m difference in level you would need about 10 million tonnes of locomotive and dead weight to store that much energy.

It isn’t going to be cheap.

Using water seems to make more sense.

Yep, use the trains to cart water around instead of concrete.

The Rev Dodgson said:

party_pants said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

24 GWH is about 8.64E13 J (or 86,400 GJ)

With 100 m difference in level you would need about 10 million tonnes of locomotive and dead weight to store that much energy.

It isn’t going to be cheap.

Using water seems to make more sense.

What about the lower end of the scale they mentioned – 200 MWh storage. Can you do a quick BOTE calculation for that?

About 80,000 tonnes

So the equivalent of 2 loaded iron ore trains about 2.5 km long each.

solid state energy is the best option

no moving parts

I would use wind turbines to split water and then just use the hydrogen for night time energy production via fuel cells

no moving parts beyond the wind turbine

a load for the wind turbine that is always consistent.

you’d use solar panels for the day time power

party_pants said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

party_pants said:

What about the lower end of the scale they mentioned – 200 MWh storage. Can you do a quick BOTE calculation for that?

About 80,000 tonnes

So the equivalent of 2 loaded iron ore trains about 2.5 km long each.

Now you raise an issue close to my heart. How much energy is there in a million tonnes of iron ore perched in Mt Tom Price, elevation 727m?

when wookiemeister is in power burning coal and oil for power will be a laughable part of the past

morrie said:

roughbarked said:

morrie said:

I have thought about such a system on a domestic scale, here on my block, many times.
I see two fundamental problems with it.

1) You need huge masses and elevations to store significant amounts of energy
2) When you recover energy from such a system, you must allow it to convert some potential energy to kinetic energy before you can begin to harvest it. Then when you want to stop harvesting the energy, you have to bring the moving mass to a halt again.

which could be a problem with huge masses of water?

With water, you don’t have the entire mass in motion. Just a small, controlled portion of it.
The mass and elevation calculations remain the same, but with water the harvesting is much, much, much easier.

amazing stuff, water.

morrie said:

party_pants said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

About 80,000 tonnes

So the equivalent of 2 loaded iron ore trains about 2.5 km long each.

Now you raise an issue close to my heart. How much energy is there in a million tonnes of iron ore perched in Mt Tom Price, elevation 727m?

Lots.

>no moving parts beyond the wind turbine

And the hydrogen compressor.
Efficient way of storing energy, do you think? Hydrogen. Compared to say, a 20 litre drum of petrol, what size hydrogen tank do you think you might need?

party_pants said:

morrie said:

party_pants said:

So the equivalent of 2 loaded iron ore trains about 2.5 km long each.

Now you raise an issue close to my heart. How much energy is there in a million tonnes of iron ore perched in Mt Tom Price, elevation 727m?

Lots.

and lots and lots.

morrie said:

>no moving parts beyond the wind turbine

And the hydrogen compressor.
Efficient way of storing energy, do you think? Hydrogen. Compared to say, a 20 litre drum of petrol, what size hydrogen tank do you think you might need?

way bigger.

morrie said:

party_pants said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

About 80,000 tonnes

So the equivalent of 2 loaded iron ore trains about 2.5 km long each.

Now you raise an issue close to my heart. How much energy is there in a million tonnes of iron ore perched in Mt Tom Price, elevation 727m?

Energy in kJ = mass in tonnes x elevation in m x 9.81

so 10^6 × 727 × 9.81 = about 7000 Gj (or about 2 GWh)

morrie said:

>no moving parts beyond the wind turbine

And the hydrogen compressor.
Efficient way of storing energy, do you think? Hydrogen. Compared to say, a 20 litre drum of petrol, what size hydrogen tank do you think you might need?

hydrogen can be stored in other ways other than gas, years ago they came up with a chemical way of doing it

they don’t seem to have much problem with “sequestering” carbon dioxide compressing a gas – that’s viable apparently.

oil produces a heap of junk in the air, hydrogen produces water.

then you’ve got to dig oil up and transport it

water can be found in most places

>hydrogen can be stored in other ways other than gas, years ago they came up with a chemical way of doing it

Well there’s a potential saving of millions of dollars of research funding.

morrie said:

>hydrogen can be stored in other ways other than gas, years ago they came up with a chemical way of doing it

Well there’s a potential saving of millions of dollars of research funding.

versus ongoing environmental disaster costing billions

you’ve got the two part wet batteries like the vanadium battery or its iron equivalent

The Rev Dodgson said:

morrie said:

party_pants said:

So the equivalent of 2 loaded iron ore trains about 2.5 km long each.

Now you raise an issue close to my heart. How much energy is there in a million tonnes of iron ore perched in Mt Tom Price, elevation 727m?

Energy in kJ = mass in tonnes x elevation in m x 9.81

so 10^6 × 727 × 9.81 = about 7000 Gj (or about 2 GWh)

Hmm.

80,000 tonne * 727m * g = 5.7*10^11J = 0.158 GWh

sibeen said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

morrie said:

Now you raise an issue close to my heart. How much energy is there in a million tonnes of iron ore perched in Mt Tom Price, elevation 727m?

Energy in kJ = mass in tonnes x elevation in m x 9.81

so 10^6 × 727 × 9.81 = about 7000 Gj (or about 2 GWh)

Hmm.

80,000 tonne * 727m * g = 5.7*10^11J = 0.158 GWh

80,000 tonnes was the previous question. This question was about a million tonnes.

party_pants said:

sibeen said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

Energy in kJ = mass in tonnes x elevation in m x 9.81

so 10^6 × 727 × 9.81 = about 7000 Gj (or about 2 GWh)

Hmm.

80,000 tonne * 727m * g = 5.7*10^11J = 0.158 GWh

80,000 tonnes was the previous question. This question was about a million tonnes.

Ahh, as you were :)

PWM asked a similar question awhile ago. Basically how big a weight would you need to lift 1 metre to have the same energy as a 12 volt 100AH battery. Works out to about 8000 kg.

Amazing how much energy can be stored in a chemical reaction :)

sibeen said:

PWM asked a similar question awhile ago. Basically how big a weight would you need to lift 1 metre to have the same energy as a 12 volt 100AH battery. Works out to about 8000 kg.

Amazing how much energy can be stored in a chemical reaction :)

Chemists rule, OK?

sibeen said:

PWM asked a similar question awhile ago. Basically how big a weight would you need to lift 1 metre to have the same energy as a 12 volt 100AH battery. Works out to about 8000 kg.

Amazing how much energy can be stored in a chemical reaction :)

I was just thinking the same thing.

Watching a show on SBS on Demand about a 747 undergoing a big overhaul. The thing is so damn big, but it gets off the ground with chemical energy.

sibeen said:

PWM asked a similar question awhile ago. Basically how big a weight would you need to lift 1 metre to have the same energy as a 12 volt 100AH battery. Works out to about 8000 kg.

Amazing how much energy can be stored in a chemical reaction :)

So you could connect a bullbar winch to that battery, and lift 2000kg 4m high before it went flat.

Just looked at some batteries and they are measured in CCA, how does that relate to AH?

Kingy said:

sibeen said:

PWM asked a similar question awhile ago. Basically how big a weight would you need to lift 1 metre to have the same energy as a 12 volt 100AH battery. Works out to about 8000 kg.

Amazing how much energy can be stored in a chemical reaction :)

So you could connect a bullbar winch to that battery, and lift 2000kg 4m high before it went flat.

Just looked at some batteries and they are measured in CCA, how does that relate to AH?

Never mind, found it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peukert%27s_Law

Kingy said:

sibeen said:

PWM asked a similar question awhile ago. Basically how big a weight would you need to lift 1 metre to have the same energy as a 12 volt 100AH battery. Works out to about 8000 kg.

Amazing how much energy can be stored in a chemical reaction :)

So you could connect a bullbar winch to that battery, and lift 2000kg 4m high before it went flat.

Just looked at some batteries and they are measured in CCA, how does that relate to AH?

Yes, thereabouts – sorta. The figure I quoted was for about the 10 hour rate. A decent 100 Ah battery will give about 20 watts for 10 hours – 200 Wh. At a faster discharge rate the energy given falls off fairly quickly. eg, for 1 hour it will give 135 watts = 135 Wh. For 5 minutes it will give 520 watts = 45 Wh.

Chemical reactions, at least for batteries like it nice and slow for best results.

CCA = cold cranking amperage. Doesn’t really relate to Ah – sort of. Normall the higher the Ah the higher the CCA, but it really doesn’t work that way. CCA is for automotive application. You want to be able to provide a burst of current for a short period of time – to start a motor – and the battery is manufactured to suit.

Peukert’s law – must admit that’s the first time I’ve ever heard of that :)

sibeen said:

Yes, thereabouts – sorta. The figure I quoted was for about the 10 hour rate. A decent 100 Ah battery will give about 20 watts for 10 hours – 200 Wh. At a faster discharge rate the energy given falls off fairly quickly. eg, for 1 hour it will give 135 watts = 135 Wh. For 5 minutes it will give 520 watts = 45 Wh.

Chemical reactions, at least for batteries like it nice and slow for best results.

So a 100 Ah battery only gives 20/12 × 10 = 16.7 Ah ?

But even at that rate I make the mass you could lift 1 metre to be about 72 tonne, rather than 8 tonne.

The Rev Dodgson said:

sibeen said:

Yes, thereabouts – sorta. The figure I quoted was for about the 10 hour rate. A decent 100 Ah battery will give about 20 watts for 10 hours – 200 Wh. At a faster discharge rate the energy given falls off fairly quickly. eg, for 1 hour it will give 135 watts = 135 Wh. For 5 minutes it will give 520 watts = 45 Wh.

Chemical reactions, at least for batteries like it nice and slow for best results.

So a 100 Ah battery only gives 20/12 × 10 = 16.7 Ah ?

But even at that rate I make the mass you could lift 1 metre to be about 72 tonne, rather than 8 tonne.

Opps, I’m not sure what I did last night with that calculation.

A 100 Ah battery can give about 135 watts for one hour, so about 4.9e5J.

This is then about 50 tonnes at 1 metre.

wookiemeister said:

morrie said:

>no moving parts beyond the wind turbine

And the hydrogen compressor.
Efficient way of storing energy, do you think? Hydrogen. Compared to say, a 20 litre drum of petrol, what size hydrogen tank do you think you might need?

hydrogen can be stored in other ways other than gas, years ago they came up with a chemical way of doing it

You can store it as a liquid cheaply and very safely by chemically bonding it to oxygen in a ratio of 2 to 1.

wookiemeister said:

you’d be better off building a dam and using hydroelectric

the best idea for powering the earth would be using solar panels connected to a worldwide network

the bright side powers the dark side

you’d need to put this power grid in reliable countries that aren’t prone to “problems” you could run a powercable from Australia up through Vietnam and china into Russia and across to Europe, the other cable would run across to the berring strait and into Alaska , Canada and America. this would provide power for most of the time with a small window of the night being powered by small scale renewables.

the cable would be multiple 500KVDC the sunlight falling on Australia could easily power its neighbours

everyone would be reliant on each other to make sure power isn’t disrupted, sure someone could cut the cable in their country but then they wouldn’t have any power either and the tanks would be rolling in to reconnect the power system

we could build them out of nano diamonds and unicorn tears!!! yeh!

>>we could build them out of nano diamonds and unicorn tears!!! yeh!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lbS2KSRUVHo