Stacking concrete blocks is a surprisingly efficient way to store energy

Re:Stacking concrete blocks is a surprisingly efficient way ... by xg15 on Sunday August 19, 2018 @08:22AM (#17794000)

< The selling point of this is low relatively low capital cost and well tested technology.

I'm sceptical of that. As the sibling comment noted, the technology is well-tested, yes but for a completely different usage pattern. You don't know how reliably construction cranes are in lifting heavy loads in back-to-back cycles, 24/7.

Additionally, I'd guess you will have to modify the cranes to realize the "recover energy" parts. I'm no expert, but I could imagine, traditional parts spend energy for both raising and lowering a weight because the design goal is reliable control of the load, not making energy. So you'd probably have to modify the motor assembly.

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Re:Stacking concrete blocks is a surprisingly efficient way ... by camtarn on Sunday August 19, 2018 @09:33AM (#17794239)

I've recently started working with wave and tidal energy projects.

From what I've been told, the magic isn't in the generators (almost every project I'm working on is just using a standard industrial motor as a generator) but in the smart regenerative drives which both supply and harvest power from them. Harvesting power from industrial processes to keep costs down seems like it's a very common thing to do, so these drives are available off the shelf, and are designed to plug into a variety of existing motors.

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