A future powered by sustainable energy sources could save the world from devastating climate change and reduce energy bills. But renewable energy has an intermittency problem — the sun provides no power at night, while winds can stop suddenly.
In addition, power grids must keep supply and demand in balance or risk surges and blackouts. As a result, renewable energy is dumped during times of excess production, while at other times, power plants burn fossil fuels to meet grid shortfalls.
“The way things are going, in five years, the amount of renewable power wasted in California each year will be equivalent to the amount of power L.A. uses each year,” said Barath Raghavan, an assistant professor in computer science at the USC Viterbi School of Engineering.
Better battery storage — a holy grail for scientists worldwide — is considered key to solving the intermittency problem by…
A new way to store sustainable energy: ‘Information batteries’ — ScienceDaily
