article · Energy Reports
Energy storage has been of paramount importance in addressing the disparity between energy production and consumption periods, particularly in the context of renewable energy sources. The stored energy can be harnessed for heating, cooling, or generating electricity. Despite rapid advances in scientific research and technology, bibliometric analyses in the field of energy storage have shown that studies on thermocline energy storage systems remain scarce. These studies examine 649 documents, including research articles, review articles, books and book chapters published in the Scopus database between 1990 and 2024, using the software programs R, RStudio, VOSviewer and OriginPro. The evolution of publications in the field of sensible heat thermal energy storage over the past 34 years are presented, analyzing trends by country, international collaborations, publication year, affiliations, authors, citations, and the connections between author communities. Based on the analyzed publications, China emerges as the most productive country, benefiting from its growing interest in scientific research, particularly in the energy sector. The study reveals that many investigations have centred on unconventional sensible thermal energy storage materials, such as rocks, sand, and solid industrial waste, which are considered low-cost alternative solutions. These innovative solutions could be key to achieving sustainable development goals, particularly UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 7 and 13, provided that scientific research evolves to become applicable on an industrial scale. • Bibliometric review of 649 TES papers (1996–2024) and 252 references. • China leads with 19.6% of global output; 10 of its universities rank in top 20. • Middle East and North Africa and Gulf TES research grew rapidly in last decade, driven by energy transitions. • Modeling studies need validation through large-scale experimental systems. • Large-scale TES pilots are rare: Morocco (6.5 MW th ) and Switzerland (12 MW th ).
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DOI: 10.1016/j.egyr.2026.109252
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