What makes Adani, JSW and NTPC go after a 100-year-old energy storage solution

Very interesting development on Grid connectivity and Energy storage solution.

In previous post we discussed that the world has plenty of opportunities to produce renewable sources of energy from Solar, Wind & Hydro. The challenge is to find a viable Energy Storage solution at the Site of Power plant to avoid Grid instability due to non-availability of renewable energy 24×7.

There are three alternate solutions known for energy storage solutions.
(1) Surplus energy produced during peak hours can be stored in in Giant lithium ion batteries or Sodium Ion batteries ( in line with EV battery pack) and later released to the Grid during non-peak hours. Here the disadvantages is the cost of battery and lithium ion is not sustainable in the long run.

(2) At peak hours , the surplus energy produced at renewable power plant can be used for Green hydrogen production through electrolyser. Green hydrogen so produced can be stored and later used to produce electricity by the help of Fuel cell technolgy during non-peak hours. This is also an expensive one through technology is implemented at many places.

(3) There is a 100 year old technolgy known “Pumped hydro storage”, which is the least expensive. In this system , there would be two water reservoirs at two different elevations. During non-peak hours, the water flows from higher reservoir to a lower reservoir by gravity and during this process falls thr a Turbine generating electricity. During peak hours when renewable sources of energy is plenty , then the water is pumped back to higher reservoir and the cycle continues ensuring continuous electricity supply.

This is the least expensive of all the three.
To understand how the “pumped Hydro Storage system” Works, please refer the 3rd article and the you tube video thereafter

Recently , in December, 2022 Greenko won a prestigious order from NTPC for deploying strategy 3 to supply uninterrupted power from renewable sources for next 25 years.

Here is an article From ET now. If you are not a prime member , you may not be able to open it.
Then I suggest you can also see the 2nd article.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/ehskGrg8hEA