A rough estimate of the most important cost factors yields the following results: The price per kilowatt hour from in­stallations which are integrated into breakwaters and can therefore be favourably costed, would, according to the es­timate of Voith Hydro, be 15 N-cent/kWh [6]. This is already notably lower than the cost of photovoltaic power in […]

In the construction and the energy management of the new government buildings along the River Spree in Berlin, future – oriented, environmentally responsible and exemplary en­ergy concepts were required [2]. The energy-supply sys­tem of the Berlin parliament buildings therefore contains, along with components for combined heat-cooling-power production, two aquifer storage reservoirs (Figure 2). The heat […]

Precisely with regard to cycling stability and operating life­time, one finds differing results depending on the applica­tion. While the battery is usually very deeply discharged in all-electric or plug-in hybrid vehicles, in hybrids it is morefrequently but less deeply discharged, as mentioned above [8]. Another important factor for the cycling stability of lithium-ion batteries is […]

by Klaus-Viktor Peinemann One possibility of obtaining sustainable ener­gy from seawater is the use of osmosis. The key to this technology is the development of efficient membranes which allow water to pass through, but not salt. O smosis is an omnipresent process, which for example causes sausages to burst in hot water. Osmosis plays an […]

For the storage of thermal energy in a field with downhole heat exchangers (DHE), the underground strata also serve as the storage medium. Here, the reservoir is tapped by a number of boreholes of 20 to 100 m depth, usually sym­metrically arrayed, and these are outfitted with probes. A geothermal field with DHE is an […]

The charging and discharging characteristics of the bat­teries at different temperatures and currents are particu­larly important during operation. They give a measure of the available quantity of energy – that is, how full the “tank” still is. However, only Li-ion batteries with cobalt cathodes have an approximately linear relationship be­tween the charge removed and the […]

BY FRANZ TRIEB I n the year 2003, the Club of Rome, the Climate Protec­tion Fund in Hamburg, and the Jordanian National Ener­gy Research Centre together developed the DESERTEC con­cept. The Desertec Foundation which was subsequently es­tablished, together with twelve industrial firms, published a Memorandum of Understanding in July, 2009, calling for construction of the […]

In Golm, near Potsdam, in 1999 the Max Planck Society founded a new science campus, comprising three institutes. The energy management system is based on a combined heating-cooling-power system, making use of a geothermal borehole field for storage (Figure 6). This concept includes a cogeneration plant driven by an internal-combustion en­gine; the excess heat is […]