Day: April 30, 2024

Paris, France — G7 environment ministers committed on Tuesday to ramp up the production and deployment of battery storage technology, an essential component for increasing renewable energy and combating climate change.  

Here is how and why batteries play a vital role in the energy transition:   

Growing demand

Batteries have been central to the rise of electric vehicles (EVs) but are also critical to wind and solar power because of the intermittent nature of these energy sources.  

Surplus electricity must be stored in batteries to stabilize distribution regardless of peaks in demand, or breaks in supply at night or during low winds.   

Battery deployment in the energy sector last year increased more than 130 percent from 2022, according to a report released last week by the International Energy Agency (IEA).    

The main markets are China, the European Union and the United States. 

Following closely are Britain, South Korea, Japan and developing nations in Africa, where solar and storage technology is seen as the gateway to energy access.  

Six-fold goal

To triple global renewable energy capacity by 2030 — a goal set at the UN climate conference in December — the IEA says a six-fold increase in battery storage will be necessary.  

Clean energy is essential to reduce emissions from burning fossil fuels and to hope to keep the international target of restricting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.   

The total storage capacity required to achieve this target is an estimated 1,500 gigawatts by 2030.  

Of this, 1,200 GW will need to be supplied by batteries.

Cost challenges

In less than 15 years, the cost of batteries has fallen by 90 percent.  

“The combination of solar PV and batteries is today competitive with new coal plants in India. And just in the next few years, it will be cheaper than new coal in China and gas-fired power in the United States,” IEA chief Fatih Birol said last week.   

“But still the pace is not fast enough to reach our goals in terms of climate change and energy security.”  

Costs will have to come down further, he said, while calling for supply chains to be diversified.   

Most batteries are currently produced by China.   

But some 40 percent of planned battery manufacturing projects are in the United States and Europe, according to the IEA.   

If those projects are realized, they would be nearly sufficient to meet the needs of those countries.

Metal matters

Another thorny issue is the availability of critical metals like lithium and cobalt that are essential to make batteries.  

Experts say the development chemical alternatives could complement the dominant lithium-ion technology.  

“Transition in the technology will reduce the amount of lithium” needed, said Brent Wanner, head of the IEA’s power sector unit, adding, “this includes shifting to sodium-ion batteries.” 

Beyond 2030, high-density solid-state batteries that offer a longer lifespan are expected to become commercially available. 

There are other storage options, although not as widely applicable or available as batteries.

Pumped storage hydropower has long been used in the hydroelectric sector.

The transformation of electricity into hydrogen, which can be stored and transported, is a new technology expected to become more readily available. 

Be flexible

Renewable energy is not entirely reliant on storage and measures can be taken to improve the flexibility of its production to meet demands.   

Industry and governments are gearing up for the transition.   

The European Union’s Energy Regulators Agency called on member states in September to assess their “flexibility potential” based on estimates that renewables will need to double by 2030.   

Such a rise requires greater “flexibility” in grids, meaning energy can be stored and distributed consistently despite fluctuating production and demand.   

The G7 said Tuesday it would not only support more production and use of battery storage, but promote technological advancements in the sector as well as grid infrastructure.

 
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SHANGHAI — The first scientist to publish a sequence of the COVID-19 virus in China staged a sit-in protest outside his lab after authorities locked him out of the facility — a sign of the Beijing’s continuing pressure on scientists conducting research on the coronavirus.

Zhang Yongzhen wrote in an online post Monday that he and his team had been suddenly notified they were being evicted from their lab, the latest in a series of setbacks, demotions and ousters since the virologist published the sequence in January 2020 without state approval.

When Zhang tried to go to the lab over the weekend, guards barred him from entering. In protest, he sat outside on flattened cardboard in drizzling rain, pictures from the scene posted online show. News of the protest spread widely on Chinese social media and Zhang told a colleague he slept outside the lab — but it was not clear Tuesday if he remained there.

“I won’t leave, I won’t quit, I am pursuing science and the truth!” he wrote in a post on Chinese social media platform Weibo that was later deleted.

In an online statement, the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Center said that Zhang’s lab was being renovated and was closed for “safety reasons.” It added that it had provided Zhang’s team an alternative laboratory space.

But Zhang wrote online that his team wasn’t offered an alternative until after they were notified of their eviction, and that the lab offered didn’t meet safety standards for conducting their research, leaving his team in limbo.

Zhang’s latest difficulty reflects how China has sought to control information related to the virus: An Associated Press investigation found that the government froze meaningful domestic and international efforts to trace it from the first weeks of the outbreak. That pattern continues to this day, with labs closed, collaborations shattered, foreign scientists forced out and Chinese researchers barred from leaving the country.

When reached by phone on Tuesday, Zhang said it was “inconvenient” for him to speak, saying there were other people listening in. In an email Monday to collaborator Edward Holmes seen by AP, Zhang confirmed he was sleeping outside his lab after guards barred him from entering.

An AP reporter was blocked by a guard at an entrance to the compound housing Zhang’s lab. A staff member at the National Health Commission, China’s top health authority, said by phone that it was not the main department in charge and referred questions to the Shanghai government. The Shanghai government did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Zhang’s ordeal started when he and his team decoded the virus on Jan. 5, 2020, and wrote an internal notice warning Chinese authorities of its potential to spread — but did not make the sequence public. The next day, Zhang’s lab was ordered temporarily shut by China’s top health official, and Zhang came under pressure by Chinese authorities.

Around the time, China had reported several dozen people were being treated for a respiratory illness in the central city of Wuhan. Possible cases of the same illness had been reported in Hong Kong, South Korea and Taiwan involving recent travelers to the city.

Foreign scientists soon learned that Zhang and other Chinese scientists had deciphered the virus and called for him to publish. Zhang published his sequence of the coronavirus on Jan. 11, 2020, despite a lack of government permission.

Sequencing a virus is key to the development of test kits, disease control measures and vaccinations. The virus eventually spread to every corner of the world, triggering a pandemic that disrupted lives and commerce, prompted widespread lockdowns and killed millions of people.

Zhang was later awarded prizes in recognition for his work.

But Zhang’s publication of the sequence also prompted additional scrutiny of his lab, according to Holmes, Zhang’s collaborator and a virologist at the University of Sydney. Zhang was removed from a post at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention and barred from collaborating with some of his former partners, crippling his research.

“Ever since he defied the authorities by releasing the genome sequence of the virus that causes COVID-19 there has been a campaign against him,” Holmes said. “He’s been broken by this process and I’m amazed he has been able to work at all.”
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Images of African senior citizens walking a fashion runway created a buzz on social media, with AI-generated pictures challenging traditional depictions of elderly Africans. VOA’s Karina Choudhury has all the looks in this week’s episode of LogOn. Videographer: Samuel Okocha
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