Renewable Energies with Energy Storage

Copyright © 2011 by Winston (Win) Stothert.

Library of Congress Control Number:    2011904590

ISBN: Hardcover     978-1-4568-9108-4

ISBN: Softcover       978-1-4568-9107-7

ISBN: Ebook             978-1-4568-9109-1

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I am grateful to my wife, Sylvia Hollie Stothert for her unwavering support and constant encouragement. I appreciate the assistance with graphics by my darling granddaughter, Jessie McGrath and by my friend Jane Alley. Our families have shared my interests with moral support throughout the development of this works.

Contents

Statement Regarding Conclusions

Observations

Chapter 1:     Energy, Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow

Chapter 2:     Current Hydrogen Production Method and Costs

Chapter 3:     Renewable Wind Energy Sources and Costs

Chapter 4:     Renewable Solar Energy Sources and Costs

Chapter 5:     Hydrogen by Electrolysis from Renewables, with Costs

Chapter 6:     World’s First Private Commercial Hydrogen Production Plant by Electrolysis

Chapter 7:     Hydrogen from Other Sources

Chapter 8:     Carbon Dioxide Emissions and Credits

Chapter 9:     Distributed Power by Hydrogen Fuel Cells

Chapter 10:   Production Potential for Hydrogen from Renewables

Chapter 11:   Wind Energy to Hydrogen to Ammonia Fertilizer

Chapter 12:   Motor Vehicles and Emissions

Chapter 13:   Gasoline Consumption and Hydrogen Substitution

Chapter 14:   Alternative Storage of Variable Renewable Energies

Chapter 15:   Water Used – Water Saved

Chapter 16:   Observations and Conclusions

Appendix

Conclusions based on opinions can be a detriment to

technological advancement.

Conclusions based on facts gained from technological

advancement can lead to practical utilization for the

betterment of humanity.

Our world has three interconnected crises:

climate, energy and water

Some of the answers to these crises are here.

When, inevitably, world energy demand exceeds oil and gas supplies, then these answers will be very acceptable.

Unless . . .

We may have reached the point where greenhouse gasses from fossil fuels have brought climate to the disastrous state of no-recovery—beyond the tipping point.

On a financially acceptable basis, it is possible to eliminate the need for overseas oil imports and reduce greenhouse gas emissions to an acceptable level.

It is also possible to eliminate the need for any

crude oil or coal used for energy.

A combination of renewable energies used directly in the grid, with some converted by electrolysis to hydrogen,

and natural gas turbine—generators using compressed

air energy storage systems—

will feed electric power from these storage systems to the grid and fuel vehicles, achieving these objectives.

Humans began storing energy when fire was invented; since then, hundreds of trillions of dollars have been invested in energy storage.

Renewable Energies For The World

OBSERVATIONS

It has been technologically proven that renewable energy sources can be developed in a socially responsible manner to supply all of the world’s energy requirements, without production of greenhouse gases. It can eliminate the need for fossil fuels.

Cost of renewable energy is often compared to the cost of electricity from existing fossil-fueled nuclear power and stored hydro-generating plants built decades past. Cost of power from new carbon-neutral fossil-fueled power plants will be equal to or at a higher cost than from renewables of wind, solar, and biomass. Wind and solar have no future cost increases due to inflation, to which the other sources are subject. Cost of any new generation systems, which are required to meet growth in demand, will cost more due to decades of inflation. These costs melded with the cost of the older plants will inevitably increase the average cost to the consumers whether from historic methods or from the new world energy.

Today’s major established sources of renewable energy are wind, solar-thermal, solar-photo-voltaic, hydro, run-of-river hydro, biomass, and geothermal. Other sources—including tidal, wave, and solar-hydrogen—are developing.

Energy from renewables is variable by nature, except for biomass and geothermal; therefore it requires a means of storage of the energy to be drawn on during periods when the renewable energy is not available. They can become a firm supply by use of hydrogen for storage, much like utilizing large hydro systems. An alternative to large-scale use of hydrogen for storage is to use the renewables to operate compressors and store compressed air in caverns with recovery of the energy through gas turbine generators, which then produce only one-third of the greenhouse gases compared to conventional gas turbine systems and a small fraction of the emissions from coal-fired plants.

Technology for recovery of renewable energy from its various sources has advanced exponentially in the past two decades and is accelerating.

Achieving the replacement of fossil fuels by renewable energy needs informing the public with clear statements of fact, followed by effective public policies and carefully directed incentives. Comprehensive estimates of adaptation and benefits are available but need better dissemination.

Hydrogen fueling stations for vehicular use can have the hydrogen produced on site with today’s proven technology, from natural gas or by electrolysis. No transport of the hydrogen is necessary, and either energy source already has an existing distribution network.

The energy efficiency of fuel-cell vehicles with hydrogen is twice that of those using gasoline. Projections are made that this efficiency advantage will be increased to two and one-half times. It had been considered that one kilogram of hydrogen was required to replace one gallon of gasoline. With the better efficiency of fuel-cell vehicles, one kilogram of hydrogen is equivalent to two gallons of gasoline.

Distributed Power Centers (DPCs) can be installed with today’s proven technology at electrical power load centers with hydrogen produced either from natural gas or electricity, with the hydrogen stored and converted through fuel-cells to electricity to meet high-value peak demands. Sufficient DPCs can avoid the investment in new power generation, new transmission lines, new distribution facilities, and conventional emergency standby power plants by eliminating the need of these additional facilities to supply when only peak power is needed or in case of blackouts.

Compressed air energy systems are an attractive alternative for major quantities of electric power storage.

Carbon, as in carbon dioxide, is an element of the earth, which is neither created nor destroyed. The carbon contained in fossil fuels came originally from the earth’s atmosphere over hundreds of millions of years. It might be argued that returning it to the atmosphere by combustion of the fossil fuels will have no adverse effects. However, is it necessary to consider that carbon removed from the atmosphere over hundreds of millions of years but returned to the atmosphere in a short period of one hundred years allows the Earth to accept it without adverse effects?

This text guides to the conclusions that

• renewable electricity can be produced in sufficient quantities, at a reasonable combination of investment and operational costs, together with electricity production from natural gas combined cycle turbine systems to supply all of the world’s needs for many generations. The continued use of the fossil fuel, natural gas with its comparatively much-reduced GHG emissions, is a practical compromise in the adjustment to a GHG-free economy.

• Electricity and hydrogen from renewables can fuel all of the world’s transport vehicles without the need for gasoline from crude oil.

Natural gas, a fossil fuel, is a limited quantity and nonrenewable. The ultimate objective must be to provide all the world’s energy needs from renewable sources. That would meet an aim of the Bruntland Commission of the United Nations: Sustainable development is development which meets the needs of this generation without sacrificing the ability of future generations to meet their needs.

ENERGY

Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow

WAVES OF INNOVATION

No. 1. The Steam Engine

In the mid-1800s, the steam engine was used as a stationary power source to begin replacing wind and hydro power, which did not always provide the power when needed. It was uniquely different than those sources in that it could provide power whenever it was needed and while moving. This resulted in steam locomotive powered trains utilizing a fossil fuel, coal, as the energy source. For the first time, man was able to travel faster than 30 miles per hour, the speed of a horse. It was limited in its routes. Production rates were increased by replacing man or animal with the steam engine, resulting in a higher standard of living. Fossil fuel was the energy source.

No. 2. Electricity

At the start of the 1900s, electricity was harnessed as a new source of energy from hydro and from steam engines driving turbine generators. Power became more readily available without having to be adjacent to a steam, hydro, or wind source. Production was enhanced and the standard of living increased. Fossil fuel was one of the energy sources; renewable energy in the form of hydro was the other. Electricity was harnessed with batteries to buggies for the first electric vehicles.

No. 3. The Internal Combustion Engine

Also at the start of the nineteen hundreds the internal combustion engine was invented and quickly found its niche in powering passenger and freight vehicles. Man was now able to travel up to 100 miles per hour and faster. At the same time this flexible form of power for movement of people and goods improved the standard of living. Fossil fuel was the energy source.

No. 4. The Airplane

Following the first quarter of the nineteen hundreds, development of the airplane increased the speed at which man could travel to 300 miles per hour and then to exceed the speed of sound. The airplane provided travel for man on a global basis for business and pleasure. It contributed further to an increased standard of living. Fossil fuel was the energy source.

No. 5. Satellites and Space Travel

Space travel later in the nineteen hundreds again increased the speed at which man can travel, astronomically; and the resulting technological discoveries and developments needed to achieve this were applied to the conventional industries, again leading to a higher standard of living. Hydrogen, not fossil fuels, was the energy source which made space travel possible, combined with oxygen.

No. 6 Renewable Energy

Economic growth in the developing countries and continuing increase in demand for energy to meet ever-higher standard of living in developed countries has caused an explosive growth in demand for energy. This has created the dual crises in climate and energy, which now require an incredibly major and rapid response to meet the energy needs which will not be available from the finite supply of fossil fuels, other than coal, and to reverse the accumulation of greenhouse gases, which many claim will otherwise destroy our life on this planet.

Standard of Living and Energy:

Every time that the speed at which man could travel and the standard of living was increased, the consumption of energy increased. The main sources of this energy have been the fossil fuels: oil, natural gas, and coal. Some power has come from hydro and nuclear sources.

Finite Supply of Fossil Fuels:

At the same time that the standard of living has increased, the world’s population has multiplied astronomically. The demand for fossil fuels has risen. However, the supply of fossil fuels is finite. As the standard of living rises in the heavily populated and previously underdeveloped parts of the world, meeting their needs of fossil fuels will require a sharing of those fuels now almost fully utilized by the smaller developed world.

Adjustments will be necessary without a choice, except for all nations, to maximize their efficient use of energy and use the several methods of developing new sources of energy—only renewable energies offering the total solution.

Energy Consumption in the Developing World:

The standard of living of people in the underdeveloped regions of the world can be measured in several ways, one of which is the average speed of travel available to them compared to those in the developed world, generally less than the speed of a horse. Another is their availability and consumption of fossil fuels, almost nil.

As some sectors of the underdeveloped world are advancing and increasing their standard of living, they require an increasing amount of fossil fuels, the most versatile being crude oil. The combination of this increase in world demand for crude oil, together with the fact that most of the easy oil has been discovered and is now at a depleting production rate, has resulted in major increases in the price of the oil. The combination of rapidly increasing world demand and the increasing cost of new crude oil sources can be expected to continue, possibly at an exponential rate. At the same time, the demand from the developed world has not leveled off. A world energy crisis has arrived.

All forms of energy used by humans is now 15 terrawatts (TW) (e) annually (source: Wikipedia 2008). One terrawatt (TW) is 10¹² watts and (e) refers to the equivalent in electricity measurement. There are predictions that this will increase, by 2050, to 30 terrawatts