Question to the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero:

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, whether her Department has assessed the potential merits of sand battery thermal energy storage technology; and what funding programmes are available to support pilot and commercial deployment of that technology in the UK.

The Department technical experts assess the potential of different energy technologies to understand their merits. There are two forms of thermal energy technology with different merits, using either “real” heat where a material is heated without a phase change, and “latent” heat where a material is melted using heat. Sand battery thermal energy storage is an example of the former technology and frequently is combined with other electricity storage technologies such as compressed air to increase efficiencies. To support development of all types of storage, the UK government and UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) launched the £28 million Ultra-Long Duration Energy Storage (Ultra-LDES) Challenge on August 20^th.