Flywheel storage for photovoltaics: an economic evaluation of two applications

Technical Report · Fri Feb 01 04:00:00 EST 1980

OSTI ID:6302132

Dinwoodie, T L

A worth analysis is made for an advanced flywheel storage concept for tandem operation with photovoltaics currently being developed at MIT/Lincoln Laboratories. The applications examined here are a single family residence and a multi-family load center, 8 kWp and 100 kWp, respectively. The objectives were to determine optimal flywheel sizing for the various operating environments and to determine the financial parameters that would affect market penetration. The operating modes included both utility interface and remote, stand-alone logics. All studies were performed by computer simulation. The analysis concludes that flywheel systems are more attractive in residential applications, primarily because of differences in financing parameters and, in particular, the discount rate. In all applications flywheel storage is seen to increase the optimum size of a photovoltaic system. For stand-alone environments, optimum configuration sizing is fairly insensitive to hardware cost of photovoltaics and flywheels for a given reliability when no diesel generator is included. Overall, the worth analysis finds a high sensitivity in the areas of discount rate, PV capital cost, flywheel capital cost, and diesel fuel costs.

• Research Organization: Massachusetts Inst. of Tech., Cambridge (USA). Energy Lab.
• DOE Contract Number: AC02-76ET20279
• OSTI ID: 6302132
• Report Number(s): MIT-EL-80-002; ON: DE81029696
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

14 SOLAR ENERGY
140600* -- Solar Energy-- Photovoltaic Power Systems
25 ENERGY STORAGE
250500 -- Energy Storage-- Flywheels
29 ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY
299001 -- Energy Planning & Policy-- Solar-- (1989-)
AUXILIARY SYSTEMS
BUILDINGS
COMPUTERIZED SIMULATION
COST
DIESEL ENGINES
ECONOMIC ANALYSIS
ECONOMICS
ELECTRONIC EQUIPMENT
ENERGY STORAGE
ENERGY SYSTEMS
ENGINES
EQUIPMENT
FLYWHEEL ENERGY STORAGE
HEAT ENGINES
INTERCONNECTED POWER SYSTEMS
INTEREST RATE
INTERNAL COMBUSTION ENGINES
PHOTOVOLTAIC POWER SUPPLIES
POWER RANGE 1-10 KW
POWER RANGE 10-100 KW
POWER SUPPLIES
POWER SYSTEMS
RELIABILITY
RESIDENTIAL BUILDINGS
SIMULATION
SOLAR EQUIPMENT
STORAGE