Power storage project proposed

Wednesday, Aug. 29, 2001 | 9:33 a.m.

Officials of a nonprofit corporation based in Boulder City plan to introduce a method of storing electricity that they say reduces pollution and costs.

Nevarest Research Corp. was scheduled to present the new technology to the Boulder City Council today. The corporation is acting as liaison between the local government and private companies that would develop the technology and build the storage facilities.

Nevarest is looking to test the technology in Boulder City.

Kae Pohe, Nevarest project coordinator, said the Department of Energy's Sandia National Laboratory has studied the process, although no full-scale unit, about the size of a train boxcar, has been built.

The storage cell works like this: electricity is mixed with chemicals contained in the unit, and a chemical reaction captures and stores the energy. When customers demand power, the chemicals return to their original form, releasing the stored energy.

The storage unit would collect hydropower from Hoover Dam between midnight and 6 a.m., when generators produce electricity for 2 or 3 cents a kilowatt. Then, when demand for power increases between 2 and 6 p.m. and costs increase from 15 to 30 cents per kilowatt, the stored energy would be released.

If the City Council approves and the project passes environmental hurdles, Boulder City would be "the first serious example of bulk energy storage," Imre Gyuk, the DOE's energy storage program manager, said.

Part of the DOE's role is to review options for new, renewable energy production, he said.