Read the following passage and choose the best answer (A, B, C, D):
Amid the hum and heat of Berlin’s Reuter thermal power station stands a shining contraption that looks out of place in the decades-old machine hall. Its silver pipes and vats contain a substance that the company Vattenfall, the plant’s operator, says could become a key ingredient for a fossil fuel-free future. The energy company, together with a Swedish start-up, is testing the use of salt to store heat, which accounts for more than half the power consumed in Germany. If it works well, the system could help solve a problem posed by renewable energy sources like wind and solar: unreliability, meaning they sometimes generate too much, and sometimes too little power. “Germany currently has enough installed renewable energy capacity to produce twice as much as it needs, it’s just not constant,” says Hendrik Roeglin, who oversees the salt storage project for Vattenfall. At the Reuter power plant in Berlin, which supplies 600,000 households in the capital with heat, the solution involves the use of calcium oxide, also known as quicklime. Vattenfall and Swedish start-up SaltX have been taking advantage of a simple chemical reaction that occurs when quicklime becomes wet: the salt-like grains soak up the water, becoming calcium hydroxide and releasing large amounts of heat in the process. By removing the water again, the substance turns back into calcium oxide. The process essentially mirrors how batteries work, except that instead of electricity, the system stores heat. Roeglin says the process can absorb ten times more energy than water, which is currently used for power- to-heat facilities. And unlike tanks of hot water, which slowly cool down over time, the system can retain the chemically-trapped energy for far longer. Need heat? Just add water. The pilot project in Berlin can currently store enough energy to heat about 100 large houses. But SaltX says the facility could easily be scaled up and provide heat to any of the homes or offices already connected to the capital’s district heating system. Such networks — consisting of pipes pumping hot water or steam from power plants to consumers — exist in many European countries, Canada, the United States, Japan and China. SaltX also notes that the calcium oxide currently mined in Finland could be safely recycled, giving it an edge over some battery technologies that use rare or toxic materials. “If your ambition is to be fossil-free within a generation, you have to consider various alternatives to reach that,” a representative of SaltX, Simon Ahlin, said during a visit to the facility. “This is an effective solution that’s available in a short time frame.”
1. The word “oversees” in paragraph 2 is closest in meaning to: 

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