The "Why didn't I think of that" thread.

[minimutly]

Every now and again something comes along that makes sense, and you wonder, why didn't I think of that?
So today's offering, subsea energy storage. It uses gravity and it's effect on seawater to put pressure on a sphere, the "green" energy source, our old friend the wind for example, pumps air into the sphere at high pressure. When the power is needed a valve opens and the surrounding water forces the air out. At least that's how I think it works...
The project is labelled StEnSea, it's a German project that's had funding and may well go somewhere??

 

[Trevorleach]

My FIL said years ago we need to use the tides.

 

[voipio]

So it's basically compressed gas energy storage, which ideally needs to be located in deep water. The main advantage of subsea storage would be that the stored gas pressure would remain relatively constant until the storage balloons were empty.

 

[minimutly]

Hmm, it doesn't say compressed gas, (air), but presumably water wouldn't work? I can't quite get my head around it...

StEnSea - Stored Energy in the Sea

Deep sea pumped hydro storage is a novel approach towards the realization of an offshore pumped hydro energy storage system (PHES), which uses the pressure in deep water to store energy in hollow concrete spheres. The spheres are installed at the bottom of the sea in water depths of 600 m to 800...

www.iee.fraunhofer.de

 

[Morrisman]

My FIL said years ago we need to use the tides.

Tomorrow’s World showed a tidal generator some 50 years ago, a series of floating platforms that wobbled and wibbled with the waves/swell, connected by gears with ratchets that rotated shafts with generators on. All very experimental, but the theory was sound and the models that had been built worked perfectly.

 

[dobbslc]

They invented this during WW2, they just need to find a way to slow down the energy release.

 

[Nomad]

My FIL said years ago we need to use the tides.

I've been saying the same for a long time. Tides around the Bristol channel are 2nd highest in the world ( 15m / 50ft tides have been recorded !), that's a lot of lift & fall energy once you work out a way to capture it
Bonus is it's guaranteed to work twice every day - windmills and solar are not so predictable


An alternative (driven by wave motion) is the Nodding Duck / Salters Duck system that has been around since the mid 1970s

Salter’s Nodding Duck

It was 1974 when Stephen Salter, a professor at Edinburgh University, first introduced a unique wave-energy conversion concept with efficiencies approaching 90% in two-dimensional sinusoidal waves.…

baonguyen1994.wordpress.com

Put rows on the West coast to capture energy from waves that have built up over the Atlantic and you will have unlimited power source.
Winter storms generate bigger (more powerful) waves which is when we need more energy - perfect.
The waves after the ducks are a lot smaller so coastal erosion would become a thing of the past
Don't fit them in tourist areas like Devon & Cornwall or the surfers will be unhappy. Call the installations "flocks of nodding ducks"? ™

Both systems give 100% "free" energy (once the generators are in place and working), as an Island we are in an ideal position to make use or ocean based energy generators...

 

[Bravheart]

Have read and seen sketches of this but no idea if true.
The area Of sea between the north east coast of Scotland and the Orkney Isles produce currents big enough to produce enough electricity to provide the whole of Scotlands needs but no one will build the inter connector to get it to where it's used.

 

[Bullet2012]

Six tidal stream projects successful in the UK’s latest renewable auctions : EMEC: European Marine Energy Centre

www.emec.org.uk

 

[roofman]

35 years ago i invented a baby's thermometer built in to a dummy and the LCD dial on the front for mum to see..The thought came after trying to get my middle daughter as a young baby to keep a regular glass stick device in her mouth without a fit....No one would take it up and i could of made millions.

 

[addjunkie]

Subsea is an expensive business, and maintenance is a bugger if you cant hold your breath!

 

[Ian X]

Tomorrow’s World showed a tidal generator some 50 years ago, a series of floating platforms that wobbled and wibbled with the waves/swell, connected by gears with ratchets that rotated shafts with generators on. All very experimental, but the theory was sound and the models that had been built worked perfectly.

I'm too lazy to google it but I recall a potentially fruitful endevour being pursued at a site off the east coast of Scotland and the pilot construction being built at one of the rig graveyard places, maybe Cromarty Firth or Moray Firth?

 

[cheb]

From my dodgy memory of reading stuff years ago: There was a trial version built in the Pentland Firth. It proved difficult to make them robust enough, maintenance was a pain and sea growth fouled the moving parts.

One has just been donated to a museum too IIRC.

 

[Bobtail4x4]

why not dam a few uphill streams and build turbines into them?

double bubble, reduces the flow of floodwater at high rainfall and sticks a bit back in the grid,

 

[addjunkie]

From my dodgy memory of reading stuff years ago: There was a trial version built in the Pentland Firth. It proved difficult to make them robust enough, maintenance was a pain and sea growth fouled the moving parts.

One has just been donated to a museum too IIRC.

Theres a fair bit of tidal based out of Orkney

 

[minimutly]

35 years ago i invented a baby's thermometer built in to a dummy and the LCD dial on the front for mum to see..The thought came after trying to get my middle daughter as a young baby to keep a regular glass stick device in her mouth without a fit....No one would take it up and i could of made millions.

I "invented" two things - a joggers light, essentially a red light with a flywheel constantly charging a small battery as you ran along - LEDs pretty much boogad that one.
The other was extruded plastic skirting boards so you could run minibore c/h pipes behind - I think Screwfix etall are now selling this....

 

[minimutly]

why not dam a few uphill streams and build turbines into them?

double bubble, reduces the flow of floodwater at high rainfall and sticks a bit back in the grid,

Simple, there aren't enough of big size to make a difference, and we do anyway (see piechart of energy sources).

 

[Mark 2]

Where's the jet pack I was promised all those years ago?

 

[Morrisman]

why not dam a few uphill streams and build turbines into them?

double bubble, reduces the flow of floodwater at high rainfall and sticks a bit back in the grid,

Unless you live near the stream, uphill….

 

[MysterG]

My Father always maintained he invented the head lamp flasher, added a DIY stalk to some old car of his so you could use it to flash the headlights on and off.
And the rear windscreen wiper.