The Power of Sand Batteries -- Revolutionizing Energy Storage...

What I don't get is when people say that the round trip efficiency of Sand is low compared to Li Batteries. My take is WHO CARES?! If you lose 30%-50% of generated renewable power storing it in Sand that's STILL 50%-70% power you would otherwise have lost because you don't have storage. And if Sand is MUCH cheaper than Li batteries and not subject to the scalability issues of batteries then it's better than nothing.

14:00 pro tip. you don't have to just go up LOL you can also go down with it! 10 stories underground 3 stories above ground AND less wall support issues and collapse problems. so the acerage is way less than shown here by a huge amount! also you build a 50 storey building they go down like 20 stories in the basement to anchor it etc. well you can build your sand silo and bury it right next to the foundation and heat it from there forever. run electric in heat and hot water comes out

There’s absolutely a case for residential heating use, if oversize your solar panel system and capture the excess energy in the sand battery, throughout the year. That can be used to heat your home through the winter.

Let's call them "thermal batteries", so people won't think they compete with electrical batteries.

That heat could be used for saunas even in the summer, or heating swimming pools.

I think DIYers will build sand batteries. You could probably build some rudimentry heating system using nothing but reclaimed bits and pieces and some tinkering

One missing point in this video is that the Li Ion batteries are Day storage, Sand Batteries can be used as seasonal storage, as Sand keeps the heat very long and is able to keep the heat from summer and move it to winter. On a limit, but much more than any other electrical battery system today!

I am a big believer in thermal energy. This was true even before I knew anything. I had a house that utilized a wood burning enclosed burn chamber in our mud room that burned wood very efficiently and heated a ceramic tile wall in the house. There was a ceiling fan near by to aid in distribution of the heat and that wall would stay warm for days. Think if you had something similar that heated sand with excess solar electricity then circulated air through steel piping in the sand to heat the wall. I feel too many people discount ideas such as these with arguments about efficiency. Once installed there is virtually no maintenance. This can be built with off the shelf equipment that would make repairs such as a blower motor easy to do. This type of system could last the entire lifespan of the home and could be self powered by the same solar system. Upfront costs, yes, but after that, you could have supplemental heat for life. The cost for this is not too much compared to the propane cost reduction it could provide. If I could reduce my propane by 30%, that’s like $500 a year, every year, forever!

Man Thank you for all those precise/precious datas 🙏🙏🙏

Passive buildings sometimes use thermal mass such as winter sun hitting walls or floors of which cement to heat up during the day and release that heat at night. This works at residental scale

You mentioned a "cold battery". Check out Ice Bear by Thule Energy Storage. This is daily thermal energy storage (DTES). Before refrigeration was invented people would harvest winter time ice from a lake and store it in an "ice house" so they would have ice in the summer time. This is seasonal thermal energy storage (STES). For winter home heat I use PV-direct to heat water in an uninsulated tank when the sun shines that at night heats the house (DTES). I am still trying do decide between sand or water or other for (STES). Thank you for a most informative video.

It's good that you mentioned the Northern parts, like Canada or Northern Europe, that's where it can be most useful. I too do not see the use of it much outside the district heating of places in colder climates, because in the Northern places you mentioned we will not get much sun from mid October - start of March, so all we have left of renewables is wind... and we have the MOST need of energy in those winter months when we cannot survive without heating and it is a huge chunk of energy we use. Lithium batteries are not the best storage medium to take in sun in August or September and then store it for December-February when it will be most needed. And even solving winter heating here makes a lot of sense because it is a huge chunk of our energy needs. Probably best options to keep energy gained during summer to the winter month are either convert it to hydrogen or such solutions as the sand batteries for heat.

A dual phase sand tank with separate cold and hot sides sounds kind of brilliant. You'd be able to do all kinds of amazing things with having both a chilled battery and a heat battery. Throw in some heat exchangers and suddenly your steel plants are powering your industrial freezers. The concrete plant down the street can cool the freezer of every local restaurant. If we think in terms of districts and communal sourcing rather than individualized solutions, economy of scale works in everybody's favor. It makes little sense for an individual house to power it's own hot water tanks when it would cost orders of magnitude less overall to do so for an entire city, plus there would never be any chance of running out of hot water.

Meanwhile in Australia, they tell us glass will be more expensive because the world is running out of sand.

I first learnt about sand batteries in Bill Millisons 'Permaculture Designers Manual' printed in 1988. They called it an 'energy store' and it is used as low grade heat for heating houses, green houses, hot wateretc, which is what this type of heat is best for, and which incidentally is the energy most people need/ use.

I have contemplated creating a sand battery for personal home heating, using Sun tracking mirrors to heat the battery. Thank you for the video

Another great video with fantastic informative points like the energy -> heat ration vs the heat -> energy ratio where I had no idea. This and many other reasons is why I love the channel 🎦🎦

using geothermal to heat and cool your house you basically are using the ground as a cold battery in the summer

Great idea! Reminds me of Drake Landing Solar Community in Alberta, Canada, a neighborhood which stores so much energy in the summer that they can use it to heat all winter.

Idk if you slowed down your speech, but this was a lot more understandable than usual 😅 You're awesome. Thanks for everything!