In Vattenfall’s central control room, algorithm-assisted operators monitor the electricity grid and the market to assess whether pumped storage should generate or pump. Kühne adds that the frequency of switching between these types of energy has increased over time due to the variability of renewable energy sources.
However, if you get the answer right, you can make a lot of money. On Vattenfall’s website describes pumped storage as “highly cost-effective.” Paper published last month estimated the impact of an augment in the number of renewable energy sources in Spain by 2050. With gradually falling electricity prices, greater variability and an overall lower need to import electricity, the authors found that in the future energy storage will be used 12 percent more often and a system combining renewable energy sources with pumped storage will result in increased profits.
Pumped hydro could, in principle, work in many places around the world, says Rosie Madge, systems engineer at Energy Systems Catapult, a nonprofit research and innovation center: “Most countries in the world have the right geographic areas for it.”
Report by Madge and colleaguespublished in October, assessed 11 countries on their suitability for pumped storage and other long-term energy storage technologies. Two notoriously flat countries, Denmark and the Netherlands, performed poorly. However, all the others were exceptionally well suited to conventional pumped storage, and a few, including the UK, Australia and China, were very well suited to high-density versions. The results were based in part on each country’s readiness and willingness to implement the technology, as well as market conditions.
However, even in this analysis, conventional pumped storage appeared to be the most suitable for implementation overall – compared to many other long-term storage technologies, including high-density pumped storage, hydrogen, ammonia, metal-air batteries, compressed air, and pumpless hydrogravity storage.