Solar power when the sun has set
November 21, 2012 -- Updated 0139 GMT (0939 HKT)
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
- Solar, wind energy can't provide reliable 24/7 power without a way to store it
- Donald Sadoway at MIT is working on a battery that would enable low-cost, mass storage
- He says if power could be stored, the energy business would be changed forever
- Sadoway: Answer to our energy issues isn't only conservation or drilling, it's innovation
(CNN) -- What if we could use solar energy when the sun has set, or wind energy when the air is calm? Donald Sadoway is working on a way to make that happen.
The professor of materials chemistry at MIT is leading an effort to develop a new kind of battery -- a "liquid metal battery" -- that would enable the economical storage of energy from solar, wind and other sources so that it could be used when homes and businesses need it.
Sadoway's work landed him on TIME's list of the world's 100 most influential people this year and last month he was a guest on theColbert Report.
In March, he described his project in an interview with CNN after giving a talk at the TED conference in Long Beach, California. "We need to have reliable sources of electricity. And wind and solar in harmony with a battery become reliable 24/7," Sadoway said.
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