Has Belgium cracked the problem of storing Wind Power?

London, 29 January 2013

Many believed that the 11 March 2011 nuclear disaster at Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s Fukushima Daiichi complex was the death knell for worldwide interest in nuclear power. That has not proven to be the case, but many countries have scaled back their nuclear efforts and Germany has abandoned it completely. The central question for countries stepping away from reliance on nuclear power to generate electricity is that renewable energy alternatives such as solar and wind lack the capacity to generate power 24/7.

Now Belgium, whose own nuclear industry has experienced setbacks, is considering an innovative sea-based facility, the first to utilize wind produced electricity to generate power during times of little or no wind.

Prior to Fukushima, roughly 57 percent of Belgium's electricity, 45 billion kilowatt hours annually, was generated by the country’s seven nuclear power facilities, but since then the Doel 3 and Tihange 2 were off-lined after metallurgic flaws were discovered during scheduled maintenance. Two more reactors are scheduled to be taken out of service in 2015 and the Belgian government has decided to phase out nuclear power generation completely by 2025, earlier if enough energy from alternative sources becomes available.

Related Article: U.S. Congress Breaths Life into Wind Energy

Johan Vande Lanotte, Belgium’s Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy, Consumer Affairs and North Sea during a recent meeting in Zeebrugge laid out a four point government Development Plan for marine areas. The most intriguing part of the presentation was when he stated that the government should designate a specific site for an offshore wind farm, with provisions, and that the government build a 25 foot high, circular doughnut-shaped artificial island two miles offshore to store electricity surpluses.

The concept behind Lanotte’s proposed Seawater Pumped Storage Power Plant is simple, utilizing gravitational potential to store energy, allowing the facility to act as a massive “battery” to store the wind power’s surplus electricity. At times of peak electricity output, water would be pumped into the island’s hole for storage, to be released to drive turbines when electricity from wind power dipped or was absent. The efficiency of this system is typically 70- 85 percent, making it one of the more efficient methods for storing energy.