AMADEUS

The project AMAEDUS will investigate the next generation of materials and devices for latent heat thermal energy storage (LHTES) at ultra-high temperatures of up to 2000 °C, which are well beyond today's maximum operation temperatures of ~1000 °C. New phase change materials (PCMs) with latent heat in the range of 2-4 MJ/kg (an order of magnitude greater than that of typical salt-based PCMs) will be synthetized. Within the project advanced thermal insulation and PCM casing designs will be developed, along with novel solid-state heat to power conversion technologies able to operate at temperatures up to 2000 °C. Using these new materials and devices, it is aimed realizing the proof of concept of a new kind of extremely compact LHTES device with unprecedented high energy density. The key enabling technologies are: novel PCMs based on the silicon-boron system with ultra-high melting temperature and latent heat, novel refractory lining composites based on carbides, nitrides and oxides for the PCM container walls, advanced thermally insulated PCM casing for ultra-high temperature operation, and novel solid-state heat- to-power converters based on photovoltaic and thermionic effects. In this regard, the proof of concept of a new kind of hybrid thermionic-photovoltaic converter (TIPV) will be performed, that has been recently formulated theoretically. TIPV cells combine the ionic and photovoltaic phenomena to convert high temperature heat directly into electricity at very high power rates. The final goal of this project is to demonstrate the proof-of-concept of this idea and kick-starting an emerging research community around this new technological option.

IGTE develops the novel, highly efficient thermal insulation for this project

Further information about AMADEUS project are available on the website of the project:

http://www.amadeus-project.eu/index.html

Furthermore, you can find a presentation of the project in the following YouTube video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?reload=9&v=D7huVnCnK8s

01/2017 - 12/2019

The AMADEUS project is funded within Horizon2020 in the "research and innovation programme" by the European Union, grant number 737054. The authors would like to sincerely thank for their support and assume responsibility for publication.