Within the sleepy Finnish village of Pornainen, a 42 foot tall and 50 foot large constructing is crammed with 2,000 tons of crushed soapstone. This isn’t a silo, it’s the world’s largest sand battery, a revolutionary thermal power storage gadget that went dwell in June 2025. Polar Evening Power developed this behemoth for Loviisan Lämpö and it’s the spine of Pornainen’s district heating community, lowering carbon emissions by 70% and eliminating the necessity for oil utterly.
Sand batteries sound like one thing out of a sci-fi novel, however the concept is ridiculously easy. Extra electrical energy, normally from renewable sources like wind or photo voltaic, heats air which is pumped by way of a closed loop piping system contained in the silo. This air heats the sand – or on this case soapstone, a byproduct of hearth manufacturing – to 1,112°F. The sand retains warmth for weeks, perhaps months with minimal loss. When wanted, cool air is pumped by way of the identical pipes and absorbs the saved warmth and takes it to a warmth exchanger which heats water for houses, colleges and municipal buildings. It’s a superb approach to retailer power with out utilizing conventional batteries.
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Pornainen’s sand battery has a 100 megawatt hour capability, ten occasions larger than the world’s first industrial sand battery developed by Polar Evening Power in Kankaanpää in 2022. With a thermal energy output of 1 megawatt it may present warmth for a month in the summertime or every week in Finland’s harsh winters. This implies it may substitute an outdated woodchip energy plant, lowering the city’s wooden chip utilization by 60% and avoiding round 160 tons of CO2 equal emissions per 12 months. It is a recreation changer for a 5,000 particular person city aiming to be carbon impartial by 2035.
Renewable power sources like wind and photo voltaic are plentiful however intermittent, delivering extra electrical energy when demand is low and falling quick throughout peak intervals. The sand battery absorbs further electrical energy when it’s low-cost and shops it as warmth for later use. Elisa, a Finnish telecom operator, makes use of synthetic intelligence to optimize this course of, charging the battery when electrical energy is reasonable and discharging it when warmth is most wanted. This protects cash and helps the grid by taking part in Finland’s reserve markets which ensures stability as renewables develop.
Over 100 employees and 40 subcontractors spent a 12 months constructing this monster and Polar Evening Power delivered it as a turnkey answer. Soapstone from Tulikivi’s hearth manufacturing was used which provides a layer of sustainability by reusing industrial by-products. This suits with Finland’s objective of carbon impartial round financial system by 2035 the place waste turns into a useful resource that powers houses. Enterprise Finland even funded the undertaking for its modern method.
In contrast to conventional batteries this technique doesn’t retailer electrical energy – it shops warmth. Polar Evening Power is exploring methods to transform that warmth again into electrical energy with steam generators however for now the battery’s primary job is to warmth. Since June it has been heating Pornainen’s city corridor, colleges and library and has exceeded expectations with a spherical journey effectivity of 90%. Which means solely a small fraction of the power used to warmth the sand is misplaced when it’s extracted so it’s a really efficient answer.
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