Designs for Hybrid Battery/Supercapacitor Systems for Pulsed Power Hot Topic at Energy Conversion Expo

For Immediate Release

Electro Standards Laboratories, Cranston, RI, shared the results of its research in Hybrid Battery/Supercapacitor Systems for Pulsed Power at a recent IEEE Energy Conversion Congress & Expo in Denver, Colorado. The attendees received a comprehensive presentation with details of the hybrid battery/supercapacitor system approach and the guidelines for estimating the performance of such systems in comparison with using batteries alone.

A simple pulsed power loading profile was provided as a basis for developing analytical expressions for estimated performance. The presentation continued with information on the estimation method. The basic idea of the hybrid battery/supercapacitor concept is to use the power capabilities of the supercapacitor to augment the good energy capability of batteries, and provide system performance of the best of both devices. Essentially, the high-power short-duration pulses would be supplied by the supercapacitors, while batteries would supply the overall average power and energy demands of the load. In this way, thermal stresses and energy loss would be minimized in the battery. The detailed discourse included: combining battery cells into a subsystem model; simple pulse power loading of battery and hybrid systems; measuring battery pulse loading and battery stress; stress reduction for the hybrid system, charge capacity improvement for a hybrid system; the merit of usable energy capacity improvement for a hybrid system; and finally experimental verification.

Electro Standards Laboratories is engaged in many critical design and development subsystems for power electronics and controls. The company’s experience is directly applicable to electric propulsion systems for torpedoes, unmanned underwater vehicles, and more. Electro Standards has developed mechanically sensorless controllers for permanent magnet brushless dc motors and low-noise propulsion for underwater platforms. This technology has included advanced modeling and simulation, support in DSP hardware development, and implementation including multilevel inverter IGBT switched inverter motor drives, multi-operating mode adaptive controller algorithms and coding.

In addition the company is currently developing wave energy harvesting systems that power autonomous sensor networks and remote communications and surveillance equipment at-sea. This technology involves the use of rechargeable batteries and supercapacitors as a smart load/energy charging system.

Information on the company’s advances in the field of electric motor control systems and power electronics is available on the company’s Website, http://www.electrostandards.com/Research-Development/. Contact the company directly at 401-943-1164 or via email at eslab@electrostandards.com. Jeannette Gouin Electro Standards Laboratories 36 Western Industrial Drive Cranston, RI 02921 USA Tel: 401-943-1164 Fax: 401-946-5790 Email: jeannett@lab.electrostandards.com www.ElectroStandards.com