Comment by IshKebab
1. The device is just storage. It would be paired with an air or ground source heat pump.
2. With good insulation you can easily store heat for a day which is all you need. You're never going to get close to storing summer heat for the winter. That's not impossible but not feasible for something this scale (and not cost effective at any scale).
3. You just heat it up and cool it down. There are no fancy chemical processes happening other than the phase change. It's exactly like a phase change hot/cold pack you can buy on Amazon.
4. I'm pretty sure this is designed for domestic heating...
It's kind of an obvious idea tbh. I don't think they've done anything super innovative... They made an aluminium heat sink..
the only new thing- no matter how they do it- is putting it on residential instead of commercial or industrial installs.
my childhood public school took us to some big commercial building- I think it was Sears' HQ- and they proudly showed us the huge blocks of ice providing chill during the day.