iTechnisches Museum Wien (Vienna Technical Museum)Penzing
Innovation Corner: Power Forward
Eight energy-storage innovations from VERBUND and Austrian start-ups and researchers, from salt-water and oxygen-ion batteries to green hydrogen and smart EV charging, plus an interactive grid game.
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One station holds an electrolysis stack of 30 cells, the kind Sunfire builds to turn renewable electricity into green hydrogen. A few steps on, a Dutch start-up stores power in water and salt, kept in tanks.
This is the second round of the museum's Innovation Corner with the energy company VERBUND, a small display that changes about every six months. All eight stations deal with one problem: wind and sun don't deliver power when it's needed. You go from a model of the Blue Battery beside a Danube hydropower plant, which can steady the grid in fractions of a second, to a parking pad that plugs an electric car in by itself. An interactive game has you ride out the swings in supply.
Every project here is one VERBUND built or backed with start-ups and researchers, so read it as a showcase. It's included in the €18 museum ticket, under-19s get in free, and it runs until 15 January 2027.
Look for
The 30-cell electrolysis stack
Look for Sunfire's stack of 30 electrolysis cells, the hardware that splits water into green hydrogen using renewable power, as tested with TU Graz at the Mellach gas plant.
The Blue Battery model
A model of VERBUND's Wallsee-Mitterkirchen site on the Danube, where a large battery sits beside a hydropower plant to react within fractions of a second when the grid wobbles.
The salt-water battery
Aquabattery's station shows how water and salt held in tanks can store electricity without lithium, with the tank size setting how much it holds.
TU Wien's oxygen-ion battery
The battery itself is on show: built without lithium or cobalt, and neither flammable nor toxic, for storing surplus wind and solar power.
The cable-free charging pad
Easelink's Matrix Charging pad from Graz: park an electric car over it and the connection to the grid is made automatically.
Good for
- Locals Who've Seen It All
- Nerding Out
- Teenagers
Skip if
You want historic machines: every station is a current project from VERBUND and its partners.
With kids
Under-19s get in free. The museum pitches the interactive game, where you balance swings in wind and solar supply, at young and old alike.
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Image credits
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- Innovation Corner: Power ForwardCourtesy of Technisches Museum Wien (Vienna Technical Museum)
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