From: black.hole.4.spam{at}gmail.com (Don Hills)

In article , "Geo."
 wrote:
>
>I think any one of those would have a bigger effect on the power grid than
>simply varying the temperature by 1C.

I don't. The energy required to initially freeze the goods is enormous
compared with the energy lost via the insulation. As it was explained to me
when I worked at a freezing works for a summer, the major energy loss is
the constant putting of (relatively) warm goods into the store, and the
removal of cold goods. In short, more energy is lost via the goods than via
the insulation.

The biggest problem with power generation is the cyclical nature of usage
during a day. The grid and generating capacity has to be designed for peak
loads, not the daily/weekly/yearly average. Any technique that evens out
the load is eagerly employed. The proposed scheme apparently would be a
significant aid to load balancing and thus significantly reduce the
generation and distribution capacity required. Same result as adding
insulation without the cost of retrofitting insulation to existing stores.

TCO applies to coolstores just as it does to computers. For example, would
you pay an extra $1 million to outfit your business with more energy
efficient computers if you only saved $500K in energy costs over their
lifetime?

--
Don Hills    (dmhills at attglobaldotnet)     Wellington, New Zealand
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