As has been referenced in recent reports, dozens of new large-scale pumped storage hydropower projects are being pursued (e.g. per the DOE’s Hydropower Market Report). So while the growth in battery-based electric energy storage is important and will provide ever-increasing benefits as it continues, it is important for us to put “traditional” pumped hydro storage in perspective.
Consider one of the largest hydro pumped storage facilities in the U.S.—the 3GW Bath County Pumped Storage Station (co-owned by Dominion and FirstEnergy):
If you needed several hours of power at a 3 GW capacity level, it would take around a million Tesla Powerwalls to do the same job as this one big plant. But to be fair, in contrast, if you wanted what we may call a “pumped hydro residential equivalent” of a single 13.5 kWhr Tesla Powerall for your home, you’d need to install, along with your own generator/pump set-up, a 440 cubic foot pool in your home’s attic—pumping its 14 tons of water up and down each time you needed to store and utilize desired energy.
While it is still a large-scale affair, pumped storage remains by far the dominant source of electric energy storage, at 97% of all U.S. MWhr of utility-scale stored electric energy, and 98% of world-wise (see table).
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