Hyme Energy ApS with Bornholms Energi & Forsyning (BEOF) to build its first molten salt thermal energy storage demonstrator on the Danish island of Bornholm. The storage facility is scheduled for completion in 2024 and will have a capacity of 1 MW/20 MWh. It will provide heat, power, and ancillary services to the local network. The company’s storage technology uses renewable energy to heat the salt using electrical heaters. It is based on two-tank molten salt storage designs developed for concentrated solar power (CSP) plants. It said it has a scalable storage capacity from 250 MWh to 5 GWh.
The two tanks are able to store electricity as heat at 700 C. The high temperature provides large flexibility for how energy can be extracted back out, including Rankine cycle combined heat-and-power production, Brayton cycle heat-to-power, heat storage for district heating, and industrial process heat.
Seaborg Technologies said the storage system could have a maximum heat loss of 0.5% to 1% per day. Costs should be between 30% and 50% lower than conventional molten salt storage. Hyme believes it could halve the price of long-term and large-scale energy storage facilities, regardless of geographical location.