Progress on Gravitricity

[Stan]

It’s coming in the future but its multi-crane competitor has gone off laterally to a slow death. Charlie Blair, by the way, is a member of this forum and of another one on which I can remember him asking how much it would cost to dig a very deep hole!

[Swwils]

Anyone who has worked with cranes, lifts or winches knows the incredible amount of maintenance they need.

How is mechanical storage of this type feasible. It would make far more sense to pump water up a tower, or up a shaft.

[AE-NMidlands]

Anyone who has worked with cranes, lifts or winches knows the incredible amount of maintenance they need.
How is mechanical storage of this type feasible. It would make far more sense to pump water up a tower, or up a shaft.

except that water isn't particularly dense, so you need an enormous amount and a very big watertight upper reservoir - which aren't in generous supply.
We all agree that we need loads more storage, but the obvious pumped storage schemes are already under development - except that none of them are going anywhare because none are viable in the UK because currently they have to pay grid charges in both directions!

Electromechanical seems doomed to fail (maybe for the reason you suggested, e.g. ARES has gone nowhere when I would have thought it was a mature technology with a guaranteed return.) Maybe the Snowdon Mountain Railway needs to electrify and put concrete ballast slabs under the floors of some of its coaches for electricity surplus times! And develop super-heavy concrete trucks to push up overnight for generation at 6 or 7 a.m! That's if we have any surplus electrons overnight any more...
But again. maybe the cost of the added wear and tear would be more than the value of the energy stored.
A

[nowty]

That's if we have any surplus electrons overnight any more...

A bit scary as we currently have 7.7GW on wind and we are still burning Coal and the Open Cycle Gas Turbines are running.

[Thebeeman]

That's if we have any surplus electrons overnight any more...

A bit scary as we currently have 7.7GW on wind and we are still burning Coal and the Open Cycle Gas Turbines are running.

We seem to be supplying 2-3 GW to France consistently now after Ukraine and the French nuclear shutdown. It used to swings and r/abouts but is all one way now it seems. I have no problem with helping Europe out of the hole they have dug themselves by too much reliance on Putin.

Wind yesterday early morning was just about Zero output hence coal etc to keep the lights on. Our nuclear seems to be down by about 2 GW at present as well.