Finland bets on unprecedented sand battery technology to eliminate the use of oil

Startup from Finland has developed a new sand battery that promises to eliminate the use of oil and drastically reduce polluting gas emissions.

A large sand battery will in the future heat the municipality of Pornainen, in Finland. The system is a type of thermal energy store that uses sand. The expectation is that the technology can meet the region's heating demands, leaving aside the use of oil and significantly mitigating carbon emissions.

The project, which promises end the use of oil, is being developed by the startup Polar Night Energy, which plans to complete its construction in one year and one month. The sand battery uses the material as a heat conductor, storing it to later generate energy.

Polar Night Energy's system is a little different in this sense, as it replaces sand with crushed soapstone. The objective is to transform excess energy produced by wind and solar sources into thermal energy through a process called resistive heating. This will heat the air, which will be carried through heat transfer tubes to the crushed soapstones. This stored warm air could be used to heat homes in Finland during the winter.

A sand battery, which is being produced in Finland and could eliminate the use of oil, will be 13 meters high and 15 meters wide, with a heating power of 1 MW and the capacity to store up to 100 MW-hour of thermal energy. This is enough to heat the entire Pornainen region and consequently reduce the municipality's carbon emissions.

According to the company, carbon dioxide emissions should be reduced by 70% with the use of technology, as it will eliminate the need for oil and reduce the burning of wood waste, such as sawdust, by around 60%.

Sand battery is more affordable than Oil

In contrast to several other environmentally harmful power generation options, Finland's sand battery represents a promising alternative. In addition to being more accessible, They have a lower environmental impact and contribute to reducing climate change. Although there are still challenges, such as energy loss in thermal conversion, the economic and environmental potential of batteries is encouraging.

It is worth mentioning that Polar Night Energy was founded in 2016 by two young thermal energy experts. The idea, which emerged in the university environment, began to be applied in the real world when the duo entered into a partnership with the energy supplier Vatajankoski.

The startup gained support from the local government. The country is facing fuel shortages due to rising gas prices. Russia cut gas supplies to Finland because it refused to pay in rubles.

Innovations for energy generation

A scientific breakthrough could change the way we store energy. Researchers from the Chemical Institute of Energy and Environment (IQUEMA) at the University of Córdoba (Spain) have developed a battery that transforms chemical energy into electrical energy using hemoglobin.

Hemoglobin is present in the blood and is the protein responsible for transporting oxygen from the lungs to the tissues, via red blood cells. In this way, he receives the nickname of blood battery.

The researchers used zinc-air batteries, which combine atmospheric oxygen and zinc metal in a liquid alkaline electrolyte, generating electricity with a byproduct of zinc oxide produced in the reaction. The prototype works as follows: Hemoglobin facilitates the electrochemical reaction, called the Oxygen Reduction Reaction (ORR).