Methods and apparatus for creating large energy storage mass through the collection and use of warmed water

Abstract

A system for heating and supplying electricity to residential, commercial, and industrial buildings using renewable energy that is stored, at little or no incremental cost, in a large mass of warm or hot water. The large thermal mass is sized based on the building. Thermal energy from a number of sources, including, but not limited to renewable energy panels, waste heat, and flue gas, are used to provide heat to the large thermal mass.

Description

FIELD OF INVENTION[0001]This invention relates to the field of renewable energy. Specifically, this invention relates to the large-scale creation and storage of water, which is warmer than the ambient environmental conditions, using renewable heat sources.BACKGROUND OF INVENTION[0002]Currently, most of the world's economies are reliant heavily on fossil fuels. Fossil fuels have many drawbacks. Fossil fuels pollute and are largely responsible for deleterious Global Warming, the greenhouse effects. Additionally, pollution from fossil fuels makes air in many major cities, such as Mexico City, Beijing, and Los Angeles, unhealthy to breathe for many people. The procurement of fossil fuels, whether in mining coal or drilling for petroleum, is inherently polluting. Mountaintop removal for coal and fracking for natural gas both contaminate ground water, endangering the life and health of those nearby. Drilling for petroleum is also fraught with hazard; witness the BP drilling catastrophe in...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0015]The present invention is an apparatus and method to store ambient environmental energy in warm or hot water, on a large enough scale, that it becomes practical as part of a renewable energy system for residential, office, and industrial uses. It is ...

Problems solved by technology

Fossil fuels pollute and are largely responsible for deleterious Global Warming, the greenhouse effects.

Additionally, pollution from fossil fuels makes air in many major cities, such as Mexico City, Beijing, and Los Angeles, unhealthy to breathe for many people.

The procurement of fossil fuels, whether in mining coal or drilling for petroleum, is inherently polluting.

Mountaintop removal for coal and fracking for natural gas both contaminate ground water, endangering the life and health of those nearby.

Drilling for petroleum is also fraught with hazard; witness the BP drilling catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010 or the grounding of the Exxon Valdez in 1989.

Fossil fuels give undue influence to governments who control large exportable quantities.

Many oil-exporting Middle East regimes are openly hostile to and contemptuous of the United States, notably Iran.

Many other autocratic “friendly” regimes such as Saudi Arabia and Kuwait are clearly unstable and vulnerable, in light of the Arab Spring.

Even without these serious national security issues, to the extent that fossil fuels are imported needlessly, a nation exports its wealth, needlessly.

Fossil fuels are also becoming increasingly scarce, meaning that their price is rising.

This has led to volatility in the oil markets, with the cost of a barrel of oil peaking at $140 in 2008.

Since then, the price for crude oil has varied from a low of $70 per barrel to a high of $110 per barrel; such swings...

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