Decarbonisation comes in the most surprising atires

In short: Startup company Antora Energy has figured out how to store renewable energy from wind and solar in massive blocks of solid carbon as thermal energy. This could become a cornerstone in the decarbonisation of heavy, high temperature industry.

How it works: Spillover renewable energy from e.g. wind mills is led through solid blocks of carbon, that gradually heat up because of the electric resistance of the material, thereby storing energy in them. Those blocks are contained in well-insulated environments, reducing heat leakage. Because of raw carbon’s sublime material qualities, the blocks can be heated to well above 1500℃ and then again when needed, either directly as heat, or converted back in to electricity.

The combination of the material qualities and availability of solid carbon plus the continued dwindling costs of renewable energy makes this solution a potentially really attractive one for heavy manufacturing.

Why it matters: Every industry - except of course fossil fuel extraction - is now exploring means to accelerate viable, low-cost ways to transition to renewable energy and decarbonise their processes. 24% of global emissions come from manufacturing and within that, high temperature industry like steel, glass or cement production is the toughest to electrify because the cost of running furnaces, glass- and metalworks at temperatures above 600℃ with electricity versus fossil fuel is financially unviable still and could be for a while.

Antora makes a really compelling case that thermal energy storage in solid carbon - combined with their new method for converting heat radiation back to electricity - could be a driver to unlock the decarbonisation of this tricky - yet essential to modern society - industry.

The solution is remarkable because heat has long been considered the lousiest type of energy: difficult to store and low in quality when it comes to its ability to “do work” - that is, use the energy for something useful (electricity for instance is much better at this). Maybe it was just misunderstood all along!

My thoughts: Sometimes, simple powerful solutions are hidden in plain sight. In this case, there was no need for a massive technological breakthrough, just reinvigorated imagination and a reorganisation of resources.

Still, there’s no guarantee that this is a silver bullet for high temperature industry and the key to success for every type of renewable energy storage solution is the abundance of renewable energy, which very few countries really have at this point. In their coverage of the topic, MIT Tech Review wrote that a single cement plant’s power consumption is equivalent to that of 250,000 consumers. On a really sunny and really windy day, renewable energy in Denmark could power 1-2 of these after covering the normal energy consumption. Point being: Investment in renewable energy storage and renewable energy capacity need to go hand in hand.

Look out for: Could we see an extended service layer to this, automising the timing of e.g. steel production to the expected peak heat moment? Could you use digital services to incentivise companies investing in this technology to reduce costs by allowing others to make use of the surge of heat or electricity when it is released? These might be very premature, naive questions, but I just have this general belief that software is there to help us cooperate better.

💬 Well said

...Said on an episode of Your Undivided Attention, a podcast by the Center for Humane Technology.

🧠 Worthwhile

• Reimagining techno-optimism, one magazine at a time. I wanna highlight a community that I have been following for a while: Reboot. It’s a community that in their own words “is reimagining techno-optimism for a better collective future.” I am in love with the mission, I truly enjoy the content and now I wanna support their latest publication, Kernel Magazine, Vol. 3.

• Join a movement to Design for Planet. The British Design Council (the organisation that gave you the Double Diamond Model ™️ ) are once again this year hosting a virtual conference called Design for Planet 2023, with a super interesting line-up of speakers! If you dig a little you can also find a cool zine they made to recap last year.

• UX for desirable spatial computing… in cartoons. An excellent, opinionated piece by Violet Whitney about spatial computing… in the real world, and the opportunities it presents. She’s bearish on what she calls “flat computing” and bullish on the Real-verse. And then she communicates with loads of illustrative doodles. What’s not to love?

🌻 The bright side

Recursion is a regular publication of essays about the relationship between technology and the Earth’s biosphere. Once in a while, it might contain sci-fi short stories. Written by Morten Bjørn Hallkvist.

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