[jakecrouch]

Lightsail Energy tried and failed to bring this to market - not sure whether this can ultimately outperform Lithium Ion Batteries, which have all the pressure of the electronics industry behind them.

[newman8r]

I feel like they have different applications so they're not necessarily competing. Obviously compressed air systems will never have the energy density of a battery, but they could be much more reliable. It also scales up really easily, and I think that's where the sweet spot is - I've heard of people sealing off caves to make giant air storage tanks for these projects.

[oori]

"sealing off caves" - would love to see, or hear the facts. Specifically, about safety of the pressure "chamber".

[newman8r]

https://caes.pnnl.gov/ - it's an interesting project. Apparently it's more like 'underground caverns' than caves.

[jandrese]

I think it is more typically done with old mines. Natural caves are far more complex systems and there are environmental concerns.

[newman8r]

you're right - it looks like the caverns being used for experimentation are the result of solution mining for salt.

[telchar]

The charge/discharge efficiency for compressed air is terrible since most of the energy gets wasted as heat. This plus the terrible volumetric energy storage density makes it a nonstarter for most applications.

[jedimastert]

I think the survival of this will be from them explicitly not trying to compete with batteries, but rather for a different market.