Originally posted by playez
Ok Im in . I cant shoot holes in the tech and its the best and most relevent tech story on the market . The move from an impressive proof of concept to proof of commercialization is not far .
Holes in the tech:
Inefficiency - 1414's statements about efficiency rely on harnessing heat that would otherwise be waste to atmosphere (I'm thinking high pressure steam billowing in to the sky after passing through the turbine blades. Without the use of this, that is purely as a storage device for electricity, this method is hugely inefficient. Think of the case of this stuff being set up at a wind or solar farm - convert wind (solar energy) to electricity; convert electricity to heat; convert heat back in to electricity; ???; profit?. What efficiency would the TESS actually produce as an electricity storage device? Maybe 50% efficiency if very lucky, more likely 20% or less.
Limited markets - the inefficiency mentioned above limits the markets. 1414TESS is well suited to the SA Water Trial because they can use the (otherwise wasted) heat to get the bacteria producing more gases to burn. The 1414 TESS is not well suited to markets that don't require heat to be used in this way (ie most of Australia, most of the developing world emerging markets). Compare 1414 to the solar farm outside Port Augusta. They had to build a whole bunch of massive greenhouses on site to justify the use of the molten salt at that place. And that process is far more efficient than 1414TESS as it simply turns solar energy in to stored heat rather than solar>electricity>stored heat.
The SA Water Trial - TESS is competing here against 2 other energy storage type of systems. As I said above, SA Water is one of the premier use-cases for the 1414 device. If 1414 is not selected as the winner from this trial it will be disastrous to the company, demonstrating that the tech is not competitive even in best case scenarios.
Price - Silicon is highly abundant, but it's also very expensive to purify. This might turn out OK over the 30 year time span the company is suggesting, but what if it turns out they are being "generous" about the useful working life? What if, in reality the silicon needs replaced every 5 years? Might be a major ongoing expense which other methods of storage don't have to worry about.
