In this online engineering PDH course, an abridged version of the Department of Energy’s 2022 Grid Energy Storage Technology Cost and Performance Assessment is presented.

The Assessment is part of DOE’s effort to provide a standardized approach to analyzing the cost elements of grid energy storage technologies, to engage industry to identify these various cost elements, and to project 2030 costs based on each technology’s current state of development.

Some of the technologies are relatively unknown except to specialists in the field. For example, gravity-based storage systems consisting of heavy bricks lifted by a crane, a heavy piston lifted by pressurized water in a mine shaft, or railroad cars loaded with heavy material moved up a hill.

Other technologies such as batteries of various types, compressed-air energy storage, pumped storage hydropower, thermal energy storage, and hydrogen are also considered.

This course is based on an abridged version of the 2022 Grid Energy Storage Technology Cost and Performance Assessment, Technical Report Publication No. PNNL-33283 of the U.S. Department of Energy, August 2022.