Clean Energy Storage Solutions
The U.S. Department of Energy has released a report which shows energy jobs have rebounded in the wake of the Coronavirus pandemic. The U.S. Energy and Employment Report, developed to track statistics across the energy sector, recognized a 4.0% increase between 2020 and 2021, with energy sector jobs, in particular, growing faster than the overall U.S. workforce.
The 200-page document noted several areas of emerging tech that have seen growth over the past few years, including renewables like wind and solar energy, which grew by 2.9% and 5.4%, respectively, in 2021, and highlights various advances in transmission, distribution, and storage technology which are quickly becoming a vital part of the U.S. energy renaissance.
Today, support for clean energy sources is at an all-time high. The growing approval of initiatives like the UN's Paris Agreement has many countries set the goal of net-zero emissions by 2050. Endeavors like this require an enormous amount of innovation to achieve, but world governments and companies alike are showing that they are up for the task. Across the board, experts predict that energy storage technology will continue to grow as the world transitions from fossil fuel dependency to other forms of renewable energy. Bloomberg New Energy Finance forecasts rapid growth within the industry projecting $640 billion in investments by 2040. This news bodes well for those within the ever-expanding energy industry as they seek to solve the issues of tomorrow.
Energy Storage Squeeze
Unlike fossil fuel production, which can change to meet demand, establishing a reliable cache of renewable energy is an evolving question. Energy derived from the sun or wind may be plentiful when weather conditions are optimal, but when they are not, they require methods of energy storage that can be accessed on demand. Lithium-ion batteries are the leading option for energy storage today due to their low cost and high efficiency. Battery storage accounted for 80% of all storage technology jobs last year. However, experts say that even with the dropping price of lithium-ion batteries, they will remain too expensive and, due to their volatile nature, too hazardous to provide an unworried solution for power conservation.
Industry-wide, companies are vying to remedy this power pickle and, in practice, setting off a technological gold rush to develop new energy storage methods and provide a sustainable solution to the energy enigma we face.
Innovate and Create
One such solution is flow batteries. Unlike lithium-ion batteries, flow batteries store liquid electrolyte in separate tanks near the battery but decoupled from the energy source. This keeps the battery from experiencing fire risks or capacity degradation over time. Another solution uses thermal energy to heat carbon blocks and store the heat and light energy from the red-hot, glowing internal components to save for later.
While this technology focuses on small-scale solutions for power storage, other companies are interested in more grid-viable sources of energy conservation. For example, gravity-based storage methods, like hydro pumps and tower storage facilities, provide an exciting preservation solution. Hydro-pumped storage technology, which showed the second largest growth over 2021 behind battery jobs, uses excess solar or wind power to pump large quantities of water uphill to a waiting tank or reservoir. Later, they use the downward flow of that water and convert the stored kinetic energy when conditions are not optimal for renewables.
Gravity towers draw on this principle by using enormous multi-armed cranes that lift and stack heavy stone blocks on top of each other in a tower formation while harvesting the kinetic energy discharged as the bricks move up and down on wires.
Each conservation method has its benefits and drawbacks, but this technology is still in its infancy, and which version of renewable energy storage will prevail remains to be seen. As these technologies continue to develop and evolve, a winning formula for efficient storage will depend on many factors ranging from storage footprint to environmental impact and will likely differ based on their employed environment.
Shorts and Solutions
New technological initiatives have increased the demand for workers in the energy sector, with energy storage laborers becoming one of the most sought-after jobs in the current market. However, a U.S. Interstate Renewable Energy Council (IREC) survey declared that companies reportedly struggled to find qualified applicants last year, citing a small applicant pool, high competition, and a lack of experience necessary to match available positions.
Finding qualified candidates to work in an embryonic industry like energy conservation is challenging. Often companies must try to pull candidates from a pool of talent that is so specific that it does not exist. To remedy this issue, Core Group Resources specializes in recruitment to fill the gaps for companies searching for highly skilled laborers. Their meticulous screening process assesses a global network of talented candidates to find the most appropriate combination of hard and soft skills to fit clients professionally and culturally.