Thermochemical storage: Correlation
Prices it moves with, and why
Thermochemical storage holds heat in reversible reactions or sorption, such as water on zeolite or hydrating lime, losing little heat over months. Costs depend on cheap reactive materials, reactor design and how many cycles the materials survive.
No public price Thermochemical storage has no public monthly price series: Research and pilot stage; no market price.What its price moves with
Zeolites release water when heated and give off heat when they absorb it again. Natural and synthetic zeolites are fairly cheap, and some dishwashers already use them to save energy.
No public price for zeolites, so the link is explained in words only.Quicklime reacts with water to make hydrated lime, releasing heat, and heating reverses the reaction. Lime is cheap and made in huge volumes, though its kilns emit a lot of carbon dioxide.
No public price for lime, so the link is explained in words only.Silica gel, made from sodium silicate, is a common sorbent for low-temperature heat storage and drying. It is cheap and stable but stores less heat per kilogram than zeolites, which limits its use.
Not enough overlapping price history to measure.Salts such as magnesium sulphate and calcium chloride absorb water and release heat, allowing seasonal storage. They are cheap, but they can cake and degrade over repeated cycles, which researchers are trying to fix.
Not enough overlapping price history to measure.Seasonal storage could keep summer solar heat for winter heating. Solar collectors are the natural partner, so the market for thermochemical stores depends on growth in solar heating for homes and industry.
No public price for solar heat collectors, so the link is explained in words only.District heating networks could use compact thermochemical stores to hold heat for long periods or move it between sites. Most networks still prefer large hot water tanks, which are cheaper and proven today.
No public price for district heating and cooling networks, so the link is explained in words only.How to read these numbers
Correlation of monthly changes (the number in the coloured pill) compares how much each price moved, month by month, since 2006 or the first month both series exist. It runs from −1 to +1: near +1 the two usually rise and fall in the same months, near 0 there is no link, and a negative number means they tend to move in opposite directions. Above 0.7 is strong, 0.4 to 0.7 moderate, 0.2 to 0.4 weak.
12-month changes compare year-on-year moves, which shows whether two prices share the same cycles even when the month-to-month noise differs.
Price function is a straight-line fit of the two prices on logarithmic scales: price ≈ k × (partner price)β. β is how much this price moves, in per cent, for a 1% move in the partner over the whole period, and R² is the share of the variation the fit explains. Two prices that both drift up with inflation can fit well without any real link, so read it together with the monthly correlation.
Lead or lag checks whether the monthly correlation is clearly higher when one price is shifted by 1 to 6 months.
Correlation is not cause. The reasons on each card explain the economic link; the numbers show how strongly it has shown up in prices. Proxy series are US producer price indexes or related prices and can blur the real link.
Data: World Bank Commodity Price Data (Pink Sheet), October 2026; US Bureau of Labor Statistics producer price indexes, IMF primary commodity prices and US EIA prices via FRED, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, retrieved November 2026. Calculations by this site.