So it starts. Let the storage games begin.

This would make a lot more sense if the heat of compression were used for district heating or process heat, and then the air was re-warmed between expansion stages by ambient temperature air and/or stored solar heat. As with heat pumps, efficiency can go over 100%

Not impressive. Hopefully we get something more elegant and efficient than 50-60%. BTW we don't need batteries to last more than 10 years because by then there will be much better batteries and much better storage.

We all suspected California was full of hot air.

CRYOBattery is better,as it doesn't need buried air tanks,or compensation reservoir. Everything is on the surface in one compact site,and almost certainly cheaper to construct. Higher capacity would be just a matter of adding to the existing storage tanks.

I see one major problem. Their closed loop water system is not closed. Since they use a pond to hold the water I see a major loss of water through evaporation, especially in warm/dry climates. How would this work in cold climates. The concept may be sound but the overall design needs work.

There is no one-off solution when storing naturally generated power for use during peak conditions. I think we will be using every one we can develop. This is very interesting, especially when combined with heat capture.

Yet another (expensive) item in the green plan...

The thought of a container failure with 4GWH of stored energy as a compressed gas spells disaster.

I think CRYO storage technology advantage is that a specific location or digging deep for the storage tanks is not required. It is not subject to damage caused by earthquakes.