More on Energy Storage in Abandoned Mine Shafts – Roman Sedortsov PhD

Pumped storage is a simple concept with massive potential.
When you have excess energy on the system, you pump water into an upper reservoir.
When you need more power on the grid, you let that stored water fall thru a turbine and re-generate the power. In newer installations, the process is 80 percent efficient.
Concerns have been expressed about the availability of sites with access to upper and lower reservoirs, or the environmental impact of engineering those sites.
With abandoned mine shafts, those concerns go away. In fact, there are literally thousands of abandoned mine around North America that are actually environmental nuisances that could be remediated as pumped storage facilities, using upper chambers for storage, lower chambers for generators/pumps.
I’ve talked about this in relation to coal mine shafts in Indiana, with Dr. Peter Schubert, below.
In Northern Michigan’s Iron and Copper country, Dr. Roman Sedortsov is looking at the same concept. One huge advantage is that these sites are already permitted, and generally have grid transmission, and even roads and rail, already installed.
Impacts on surface are minimal to actually positive, and huge opportunities to revive small communities in some of our most beautiful countrysides.

Michigan Technological University:

Researchers say it’s time to write a new chapter in mining history — a story that honors heritage, mitigates hazards and creates stable power grids that benefit host communities.

Pumped hydroelectric storage isn’t new. Putting closed-loop systems in old mines is. A new comprehensive initiative finds the power in heritage, slaying two grand challenges with a single elegant solution.

Researchers in Michigan Technological University’s Keweenaw Energy Transition Lab answer the urgent need for reliable energy grids with PUSH, or pumped underground storage hydro, a global-first closed-loop underground energy storage system that other countries are exploring to help solve the problems of abandoned mines and reliance on fossil energy. 

The Russian invasion of Ukraine launched in early 2022 brings the energy picture into even sharper focus, said Sidortsov — especially the world’s dependence on fossil fuels delivered at the whims of undependable suppliers.

“This future is only possible with sufficient electricity storage, which PUSH can help to provide. Yet the lessons do not end there,” he said. “This war exposed the inadequacy of many energy conceptions that have been dominant since the 1970s. How to measure energy security, resilience and value of energy systems in the national and local context — all these questions need to be rethought. Let’s take energy security, for example, which is typically defined by the availability and affordability of an energy commodity like oil or natural gas. Yet people do not necessarily need oil or natural gas — what they need is to warm or cool their houses, get from home to work and charge their gadgets.” Or to paraphrase renowned energy policy thought leader Amory Lovins, people don’t want kilowatt-hours — they want hot showers and cold beer.

Sidortsov said the system he and his team studied can be designed to sell the stored electricity on a market while also meeting the host community’s needs, creating a resilient, stable energy source.

“Moving away from the fossil fuel-powered world where the most questionable political regimes play a central role and toward a more distributed, clean and mostly electricity-powered future is one of the main lessons of this senseless and bloody war.”Roman Sidortsov, PUSH team leader, energy policy expert

Researchers identified roughly a thousand PUSH-suitable sites in 15 states, then further grouped them based on factors including proximity to existing solar and wind power generation facilities, solar and wind resources, major load centers, and transmission and distribution infrastructure. Although the researchers used the single most comprehensive mines database available, it lacked data for many states with a history of mining. This study is just a start, they say; there are more mines to identify, more electricity markets to analyze and more legal and social factors to evaluate. 

Sidortsov quotes Swedish colleagues from Mine Storage who say, “‘The world is like Swiss cheese. It’s full of mines.’ We can solve this problem with something we already have. We’re talking about energy security at multiple levels.”

Expanding the initiative could hold promise for hundreds of other U.S. and global communities.