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At the Silicon Valley Energy Storage Symposium and Technology Showcase on January 20 in Sunnyvale, CA about 100 people attended to discuss energy storage technologies and the challenges we face.
Organized by Joint Venture of Silicon Valley, the symposium brought together key public officials, private sector leaders, academia and research participants whom engage in a discussion of the future of energy storage. For additional information about Joint Venture’s work and events, go to the last section of this article.
Storage technologies are an important element of the smart grid. In his keynote address, Brad Roberts presented ‘Electricity storage – Optimizing the use of renewable energy’.
Brad Roberts is the Power Quality Systems Director for S & C Electric Company and Executive Director of the Electricity Storage Association (ESA). In 2008, Mr. Roberts also lead the Electricity Advisory Committee - Energy Storage Technologies Subcommittee - at the US Department of Energy.
Mr. Roberts said that two huge industries, the utility and automotive, are in the process of transformation where energy storage is the problem as well as the solution for both. “Storage is one of a set of new resources and technologies that will facilitate a smarter grid. More bulk and distributed storage will help balance demand and bulk-power resources and dealing with transmission constraints,” he said. Both of the above industries will benefit from acceleration of battery technology development.
Roberts talked about the dilemma electricity storage creates: on one hand, existing storage programs have been successful, key to productivity, and are a driver in the consumer electronics industry (i.e. batteries in handheld devices as cell-phones, portable media players, portable game consoles, etc). However, moving electricity storage to the utility grid is viewed as expensive and unnecessary.
Roberts defined Electricity Storage as the process of using grid power to transform electricity to a storage media for release back to electricity when needed.