Trimet proposes to use molten aluminium as “batteries”

The aluminium industry is constantly struggling with energy issues as it takes a lot of electricity to produce aluminium pushing up the cost of production. In this regard, renewable energy comes especially handy as you have the opportunity to avail cheap or even free energy. That is Germany is trying to do and manages is pretty well when the sun and wind cooperate in energy generation. At other times, the energy prices soar. Trimet Aluminium has come up with a solution to this disparity – storing energy in the large pools of aluminium.

During the electrolysis process used in the smelting stage, the negative and positive electrodes are submerged in a tank with an alumina dissolved bath and using electricity it is separate into aluminium and oxygen. The heavy aluminium sinks to the bottom while the lighter oxygen floats above it and this combination, along with the electrodes, acts as a giant battery. This battery absorbs electricity from the grid when energy is cheap and resells the power when the demand peaks.

Trimet, that uses 290-megawatt for its smelter, can cut down nearly 25 percent of its energy drain by temporarily reducing its power consumption when prices are high. Trimet’s head of energy management, Heribert Hauck says that this method can be eventually used to store as much as 3,360 megawatt-hours worth of energy which is enough to power 300,000 homes for one day. This energy can then be transferred to production without changes, Hauck says.

Marian Klobasa from Germany’s Fraunhofer Institute of System and Innovation Research ISI says that this could be an interesting option for the energy-intensive aluminium industry which will help the aluminium producers if the power market volatility continues to increase.

This technology may also be applied to other energy-intensive industrial processes that use electrolysis method like chlorine making for the production for paper, fabric, paint, drugs and antiseptics.