Convocatoria 2021 - «Proyectos de Transición Ecológica y Transición Digital»
SUBPROYECTO 1: I3A-Unizar
- IP 1 COORDINADOR 1 (Nombre y apellidos): Ana Lázaro Fernández
- TÍTULO - TITLE: Smart Thermal Energy Storage for decarbonization of the energy sector: energy integration (STES4D-int)
SUBPROYECTO 2: UPV-EHU Universidad del País Vasco
- IP 1 (Nombre y apellidos): Gonzalo Diarce Belloso
- IP 2 (Nombre y apellidos): Ane Miren García Romero
- TÍTULO - TITLE: Smart Thermal Energy Storage for decarbonization of the energy sector: thermal performance (STES4D-therm)
SUBPROYECTO 3: CIEMAT
- IP 1 (Nombre y apellidos): Rocío Bayón Cabeza
- TÍTULO - TITLE: Smart Thermal Energy Storage for decarbonization of the energy sector: storage materials (STES4D-mat)
Energy storage is regarded by the EU’s Horizon Europe program as a key technology to contribute to decarbonization of society, since it enables the management of the mismatch between demand and production hours of energy, allowing the exploitation of synergies and interactions between the different energy resources consumed. Society requires a high amount of thermal energy (50% of the final energy demand worldwide), which is today mainly served by fossil fuels or biomass. As gathered in the PNIEC 2021-2030, there is an imperative need to promote solutions for the development of thermal renewable energies. However, due to their inherent intermittent nature, this can be only achieved if efficient and technologically mature thermal energy storage (TES) systems are available.
Accordingly, the STES4D project aims to contribute to: (i) the deployment of TES systems to reduce CO2 emissions related to the thermal energy demand in buildings and industry and, (ii) to enable the increase of renewable sources integration into energy production and management. The scope is not limited to TES systems for a direct integration of renewable thermal sources, such as solar thermal or industrial waste heat, but also to increase the renewable share in power to heat or polygeneration systems (e.g. energy communities) improving the flexibility of energy grids.
The contribution to the definitive deployment of TES systems within complex energy systems relies on three levels of knowledge: (i) materials, (ii) TES system and (iii) complex energy system. The related literature shows that extensive research has been conducted in recent years in both the field of storage materials and TES systems levels. However, to contribute to the definitive deployment of thermal storage systems within complex energy systems, it is essential to develop systematic design and evaluation methodologies that consider the interrelated aspects of the three action levels mentioned above.
STES4D will propose methodologies to improve the TES system design and operation encompassing these three levels and will apply the proposed methodologies to three specific energy applications covering also three temperature ranges (low, medium and medium-high). This way, systematic assessments of the actual role of TES technologies in the decarbonisation challenge will be attained for various final applications within complex energy systems. The scope and specific challenges to be faced in each level of action are detailed in the next figure.
Acknowledgments
This work has been partially financed by the State Research Agency (SRA) and European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), and the publication is part of the project TED2021-131061B–C31, TED2021-131061B–C32 and TED2021-131061B–C33, funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and by the European Union "NextGenerationEU"/PRTR".
