Solar-powered heat battery generates steam for oil production near Taft
Renewable and conventional energy are once again coming together in Kern County as a startup based in Alameda uses a “heat battery” to produce steam for enhanced oil production near Taft.
Rondo Energy’s partnership with local oil producer Holmes Western Oil Corp. uses electricity from an on-site photovoltaic solar array to heat a container of brick and iron to more than 1,800 degrees. The resulting thermal energy is then used to produce steam for injection around the clock in the Midway-Sunset Oil Field.
The 100 megawatt-hour thermal battery, believed to be the largest of its kind, is being replicated at three commercial operations in Europe that were looking for a technology that costs less than using natural gas and emits no greenhouse gases.
Separately, a local company is working to turn depleted oil reservoirs into long-term energy storage by investing renewable energy from the power grid to build up heat underground for eventual creation of steam. The vapor will drive turbines capable of creating energy for a period of months.
What’s especially valuable about Rondo’s heat battery is its potential for helping decarbonize industries that have historically put out large amounts of greenhouse gases. Activities such as cement and steel production require high heat that renewable energy hasn’t generally achieved.
Rondo founder John O’Donnell, who serves as the company’s chief innovation officer, noted the battery was structurally engineered and fabricated in Bakersfield.
“People talk about Kern County as being kind of an all-of-the-above energy leader, and we’re excited to be part of that story,” he said. “We think we can extend that story really dramatically.”
Although he declined to disclose the unit’s price, he said the brick used in the battery costs is inexpensive, resulting in a total system cost that amounts to one-third to one-quarter of the cost of a lithium battery system.
According to the company, the operation has run for 10 weeks meeting all performance expectations without any safety incidents.
O’Donnell said the technology has many benefits: It fixes costs instead of relying on fuels whose prices fluctuate, requires no air permit because there are no emissions, earns credits under California’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard and cuts expenses related to the state’s Cap-and Invest program.
Rondo added in a news release Thursday that the batteries can’t catch fire, explode or leak toxic materials.
The company said it is working on several continents to deploy its heat batteries in applications such as chemical manufacturing, biofuels production, cement making and beverage and food operations.