[Music] a traditional pump storage Hydro power station is a kind of gravity battery using water in an upper Reservoir to store and release energy this water can easily flow down from the elevated reservoir to spin turbines and generate electricity however it lacks the density of say concrete or lead so what if the flexibility of flowing water and the high density of other materials could be combined well that's the idea from re-energize and their r19 breakthrough for long duration clean energy storage gravity energy storage is brilliantly simple it's how those original cuckoo clocks with the suspicious bird inside work a heavy weight is lifted and because of its height it stores potential energy that's released as the weight descends driving the clocks mechanisms the same principle is used in closed loop Hydro power system systems where water goes up and down between contained reservoirs energy is generated during times of high demand by releasing water and spinning a turbine on The Descent the water is then pumped back up when there is excess energy on the grid ready for another cycle this is fundamentally how the re-energized system works too but it has an Innovative breakthrough that could make it more accessible and cheaper because although pump storage is a beautifully Simple Technology that's been in use used since 1907 it's limited by geography and cost for me one of the most stunning examples showing the scale of recent pump storage is in the Swiss Alps opening in 2022 after 14 years hard graft the 900 megawatt nutron has a storage capacity of 20,000 megawatt hours equal to 400,000 EV batteries it's over 2,000 m above sea level and the height difference between reservoirs is more than 400 m with the upper Reservoir holding 25 million cubic M of water or about 100 billion Cups of Tea sounds pretty good now this is all well and good for countries that have the funds and geography to allow for these pumped Hydro systems but how can more places get access to This brilliant technology this is where re-energize comes in with their waterless Hydro energy system that needs less height to produce the same amount of power as conventional pumped Hydro therefore it can work on small hills instead of mountains it also requires much less liquid I would argue it's not exactly waterless like the headline suggest the fluid going around the closed loop hydro system is a type of slurry which does have some water content but is about 2 and a half times the density though in the headlines defense if I asked for a glass of water and someone gave me a cup of slurry I'd probably be pretty disappointed the high density of this new fluid means the Innovative liquid stores 2 and 1 half times the energy using the same volume of liquid to pack the same punch re-energize estimates that storage tanks or reservoirs 60% smaller than conventional systems could be used and that's not all because the fluid is more dense it only requires 40% of the height difference between tanks to deliver the same power if used at grid scale more energy storage would give the growing supply of wind and solar somewhere to go when it's not needed matching supply and demand we really need long life long duration bulk energy storage that doesn't cost the Earth to create or dispose of this is the cool re-energize is trying to answer so who are reenergize well like many of the companies trying to shake up the energy space they're a startup one of the co Founders Professor Richard Cochran was actually my supervisor during my undergrad he sadly passed away in 2023 but his legacy lives on through many of his great projects re-energizes brainchild is high density hydro which they say is low cost energy efficient and environmentally benign they're looking at 10 to 50 megawatt projects and have identified 6,500 potential sites identified in the ukuk alone where small hills can work the same magic as giant mountains on smaller more widespread scale so how exactly does their new system work and differ from conventional closed loop pump storage systems so now let's have a closer look at their fluid and what that means for the general operation of the plant the slurry has an ultra fine M powder of solid particles mixed into it and a surfactant to keep it suspended the highdensity fluid is patented as r19 but what is exactly is a closely guarded secret all the company is saying is that it's so simple it can be mixed on site using Ultra cheap readily available and environmentally benign ingredients used in oral medication you'd think that this dense heavy slurry mixture would be extremely viscous and thick which would cause losses and inefficiencies as it flows through the pipe but in fact it's highly tuned to reduce the viscosity and allow it to flow surprisingly easy easily you can see from this video that the viscosity which is 20 Cento compared to Waters one is still fairly fluid it's not as thick as baby oil at 28 centio or single cream at 65 let alone honey which is 4,000 still it is a bit thicker than water reenergize say they can counteract the losses in efficiency which occur mainly in the pipes by making these pipes slightly thicker I did some calculations that show the pipes only need to be about 25 to 30% thicker to account for the increased viscosity so that checks out I've left a link down to the calculations in the description in case you're interested being able to run quick calculations like that is such a useful skill so before we check out one of the demonstrator plants for the r19 system I want to tell you about today's sponsor brilliant who can help you run these sort of calculations too brilliant lets you learn by doing by trying things at your own Pace you can gain a true understanding of maths science and engineering to reach your goals whether it's passing an exam writing a thesis or building a game-changing Energy System they have thousands of lessons from the basics up to the advanced that helped me during my studies to start understanding so many new topics brilliant is for everyone from students to professionals and lifelong Learners the lessons are super interactive and the bite-size sections will help you meet your goals in between everything else you have in your schedule understanding the interplay between forces materials and time is a complex topic but Brilliance Hands-On approach lets you tackle it in an easy way whether you're a beginner or more advanced in your current knowledge it's great fun and you may find that learning soon becomes habitual with fantastic real world things to get your hands on like this lesson that lets you play around with pricing data for electric vehicles whether it's for career progression or your own curiosity you should definitely check out brilliant my link brilliant.org zeroth which will be down in the description to get 30 days free and 20% off an annual plan okay now back to re-energizes r19 system one challenge for this idea is that highdensity fluids in pumped storage are more sensitive to changes in temperature so should be kept within an optimal range throughout operation cold weather increases the viscosity making it harder for the fluid to flow around so controlling temperature is really important this temperature control is done using a heating element or excess heat from the turbines ensuring the temperature remains within optimal ranges despite the weather conditions though I can imagine in some locations this energy demand to keep it warm could get extremely high so it might be better suited for some warmer climates large pumped Hydro with water can mitigate some freezing effects because they have deep reservoirs that only freeze on the top meter or so but it's not clear how the r19 fluid would react in this scenario another concern is that the water and solids in the r19 fluid could separate over time to prevent this particles must be extremely finely miled it also helps to keep the liquid moving which I'm guessing would be easily achieved because it would be pumped up and down between the reservoirs while all this pencil pushing and calculations is interesting will it actually work in the real world well there's already been a first demo on a ski hill in Canada validating the idea at the same elevation the power obtained from the R9 system compared to water was double water could only achieve the same power output and storage capacity when the elevation was double that of the high density fluid proving that their fluid only needs half the elevation and now construction of a 500 KW demonstrator has started in England at a in site outside of Plymouth it's scheduled to be operating very soon if it works it will help the mine secure its energy needs and at the same time decarbonize some of the operations although they're not saying by how much hopefully I might be able to visit this in the future and give you an on-site update re-energize sees mines as a great place to use this technology because they already have elevation differences and experience working with slurries reenergize SE Steven Crusher said they plan to have a 10 megawatt grid scale project in operation within 2 years the Future Vision is to have power ratings of at least 100 megaw by 2030 these will apparently be able to deliver power for 2 to 10 hours I also read about a partnership re-energized is part of to create a micro grid coupled with solar power that will provide round thee clock renewable energy to a collective of Apple farmers in South Africa's Western Cape I couldn't find anything about its progress but it would be an interesting application for places where the National Grid isn't always reliable or small scale operations who just want to run on clean energy from what I've seen there are four main benefits that make this idea worth pursuing one is that with its increased energy density high density Hydro is more agile and could be more quickly and easily constructed two is that it could reduce the environmental footprint if done responsibly due to smaller Reservoir needs which are about the size of a football pitch there's also little to recycle and less rare earth metals compared to batteries three is re-energizes innovation Builds on wellestablished pump storage technology which could improve its chances of success and reduce R&D costs and last but not least cost which re-energize says is much cheaper than conventional pump storage because of its simplicity the abundance of materials reduced volume requirements and minimal installation costs as with conventional pumped Hydro is also better for long duration storage because there's no inherent leaks or degradation like you have with lithium ion batteries re-energize say they have a projected levelized cost of storage which is the average lifetime cost of electricity stored of around $150 per megawatt hour compared to a lithium ion battery project of $25 per megawatt hour also compared to lithium ion's 85 to 90% round trip efficiency a re-energized pump storage system can achieve apparently 83% grid toog grid efficiencies if it can be done at these costs and with all the environmental benefits they claim I'd love to see it succeed but will the temperature controls work long term will the fluids cause problems as they continuously go around the closed loop as with all of these Innovations only time will tell as you're still watching please consider subscribing it's free we'll keep you up to date and help support the channel also I think you might like some of the other videos I make like this one on whether domes are the future of desalination also don't forget to check out today's sponsor brilliant and as always thanks for watching