Abstract
Allowing a large amount of renewable energy sources, such as rooftop solar arrays and wind turbines, for residential homes requires energy storage devices, such as Pb and Li-ion batteries. However, the materials for those batteries, such as zinc, lead, lithium and other minor metals, are facing to deficiency in the coming 50 years. This paper presents a novel energy storage device for residential use using mechanical energy that we have proposed as Lifting Mass Mechanism (LMM) concept. The device hoists a mass to store energy as potential energy when surplus energy is produced. By contrast with storing energy, the device releases the hoisted mass to generate power corresponding to energy demands using adequate control algorithms based on real-time energy state monitoring. Thus, we have designed and fabricated a prototyping of that mechanism to clarify overall energy efficiency. The experimental result shows that generation efficiency was 2.1%.
