Novel honeycomb design for better thermochemical energy storage capabilities

Novel honeycomb design for better thermochemical energy storage capabilities

EU-funded researchers have successfully designed and validated an innovative redox thermochemical energy storage reactor/heat exchanger that promises to make a concrete contribution to the EU’s energy and climate change ambitions.

The RESTRUCTURE project, which officially ended in January 2016, performed the validation at a semi-pilot scale system of about 74 kWh capacity and was constructed and operated at the Juelich Solar Tower (STJ), Germany.

Although the storage capacity was relatively low, this was the first time that such a concept was validated under near-realistic conditions for thermochemical heat storage applications.

Producing the redox honeycombs

‘The novelty of the [RESTRUCTURE] reactor design relates to the use of a monolithic honeycomb ceramic structure as its building block, in which the active material can be incorporated via several ways,’ explains project coordinator Dr George Karagiannakis. ‘This structure is very similar to the ceramic ‘bricks’ used in the catalyst converters in motor vehicles.’

Source: http://cordis.europa.eu/news/rcn/124820_en.html?isPermaLink=true