Save Electricity in the Air Liquid

A British company developed a technique of storing energy generated from wind power and sunlight. This technique uses air stored in liquid form.

Renewable energy sources have a period because the sun does not always illuminate a location the whole time, and wind does not always blow. However, electricity is still needed at the time of no sun or wind.

To address that problem, Highview Power Storage develop a way to store energy generated by wind and sunlight can be used as a backup for the second time these natural elements are not available.

Cryo System of Energy-owned company that uses excess electricity to power the air conditioning machine. The machine will reduce the air temperature to -196 degrees Celsius so that the air becomes liquid. The liquid was collected in a tank insulated with low pressure.

When electricity demand is high, liquid air was removed to a place that its temperature slightly warmer than -196 degrees Celsius so that turned into gas, which is used to drive turbines that generate electricity.

This system is only able to produce an efficiency of 50 percent. This means that electricity generated compared to only 50 percent of electricity used for cooling systems. Efficiency increased to 70 percent when warm air is used. According to the Highview Power Storage, efficiency can be further increased if the system is installed in facilities that have heat dissipation.

Other systems, which can be used to save energy, use water. Excess electricity used to pump water to the shelter of high position. When electricity is needed, the water flowed down through the dam and turn turbines. "Water pumping is more expensive and not supportable CryoEnergy system," wrote a magazine article on Gizmag.

Another way to save energy is with the battery. However, the cost for storage that is 4000 dollars per kilowatt (KW). Cryo Energy only cost 1000 U.S. dollars per KW.

Cryo Energy project currently running in Scotland for 9 months. Highview plans to build commercial-scale system with a capacity of 3.5 MW. In 2014, they plan to make the 8 MW to 10 MW.