Future scope and directions of nanotechnology in creating next-generation supercapacitors

The primary global research scheme of the 21st century is nanotechnology. Looking forward to the future, nanotechnologies’ generalized diffusion will seem to turn them into supplies, generating more space for privileged and superior values of applications such as information technology, nanoenergy, nanobiotechnologies, and nanomaterials.1-5 In general, nanotechnology is the understanding and controlling of the matters of dimensions of approximately 1-100 nm, in which a unique phenomenon facilitates novel applications.2 The application domains covered by nanotechnology are discussed in detail in this chapter

Advances in Supercapacitor Technology and Applications Ⅱ

Energy storage is a key topic for research, industry, and business, which is gaining increasing interest. Any available energy-storage technology (batteries, fuel cells, flywheels, and so on) can cover a limited part of the power-energy plane and is characterized by some inherent drawback. Supercapacitors (also known as ultracapacitors, electrochemical capacitors, pseudocapacitors, or double-layer capacitors) feature exceptional capacitance values, creating new scenarios and opportunities in both research and industrial applications, partly because the related market is relatively recent. In practice, supercapacitors can offer a trade-off between the high specific energy of batteries and the high specific power of traditional capacitors. Developments in supercapacitor technology and supporting electronics, combined with reductions in costs, may revolutionize everything from large power systems to consumer electronics. The potential benefits of supercapacitors move from the progresses in the technological processes but can be effective by the availability of the proper tools for testing, modeling, diagnosis, sizing, management and technical-economic analyses. This book collects some of the latest developments in the field of supercapacitors, ranging from new materials to practical applications, such as energy storage, uninterruptible power supplies, smart grids, electrical vehicles, advanced transportation and renewable sources

Energy management and control strategies for the use of supercapacitors storage technologies in urban railway traction systems

In recent years the need to reduce global energy consumption and CO2 emissions in the environment, has been involved even in the railways sector, aimed at the highly competitive concept of new vehicles/transportation systems. The requirements hoped by the operating companies, particularly as concerns tramway and metro-train systems, are increasingly focused on products with so far advanced features in terms of energy and environmental impact. In order to accomplish this possible scenario, this could be put into effects in technological subsystems and critical components, which are able to fulfill not only functional and performance requirements, but also regarding the new canons of energy saving. On the other hand, the regional and national energetic political strategies impose a continuous effort in the eco-sustainability and energy saving direction both for the vehicles and for the infrastructure management. In this scenario, the thesis aims to fill the gap in the technical literature and deals with improving the energy efficiency of urban rail transport systems by proposing both design methodologies and effective control strategies for supercapacitor-based energy storage systems, to be installed on-board urban rail vehicles or along the rail track. Firstly, a deep, rigorous and comprehensive study on the factors which affect energy issues in a DC-electrified urban transit railway system is carried out. Then a widespread overview of the currently available strategies and technologies for recovery and management of braking energy in urban rail is presented, also by providing an assessment of their main advantages and disadvantages alongside a list of the most relevant scientific studies and well established commercial solutions. Afterwards, some effective control strategies for the optimal energy management of the supercapacitor-based energy storage system have been studied. Extensive simulations have been performed with the aim of validating the proposed techniques by employing a methodology which is based on tests carried out by means of scale models of the real systems. A wide range of experimental tests has been developed and carried out on a laboratory-scale simulator for a typical urban service railway vehicle, in order to fully confirm the theoretical performances, validity, and feasibility of the studied controls, and quantify the technical and economic advantages obtained in terms of global energy saving, voltage regulation, power compensation and infrastructure power loss reduction. The overall goal of this study is to gain an understanding of the methods and approaches for assessing the use of supercapacitor storage systems in urban rail transit oriented to the optimization of the energy saving and the reduction of the vehicle energy consumption, for whatever technological solutions are adopted

Control of Energy Storage

Energy storage can provide numerous beneficial services and cost savings within the electricity grid, especially when facing future challenges like renewable and electric vehicle (EV) integration. Public bodies, private companies and individuals are deploying storage facilities for several purposes, including arbitrage, grid support, renewable generation, and demand-side management. Storage deployment can therefore yield benefits like reduced frequency fluctuation, better asset utilisation and more predictable power profiles. Such uses of energy storage can reduce the cost of energy, reduce the strain on the grid, reduce the environmental impact of energy use, and prepare the network for future challenges. This Special Issue of Energies explore the latest developments in the control of energy storage in support of the wider energy network, and focus on the control of storage rather than the storage technology itself

Voltage equalisation techniques for high capacitance device modules

Phd ThesisTraditionally, the electrochemical battery has been the prime medium by which electrical energy is stored for future use. Increasingly, the demands of modern systems such as electric vehicles, renewable energy, distributed generation, smart grid and others has stretched the development of new chemistries, materials and assembly techniques for electrochemical batteries. Additionally, some load profiles in these applications demand extremely high dynamic behaviour which is either undeliverable by conventional electrochemical batteries or is undesirably damaging to these technologies. As such, a family of electrochemical storage, known generally as supercapacitors or ultracapacitors, have been developed and implemented for such applications. In recent years advancements in electrochemical technology has led to hybridisation of high capacitance devices. Lithium-ion capacitors that are used in this work are, with their higher cell voltage and modern packaging, expected to be among the next emerging families of state-of-the-art electrical energy storage devices. The relatively low cell voltage of high capacitance cells requires them to be connected in series to attain a system level voltage. During charging and discharging, manufacturing tolerances between the cells results in voltage mismatch across the stack. Mismatched voltages are an inefficient use of the energy storage medium and can lead to dangerous failures in the cells. Several techniques exist to limit the variance in cell voltages of supercapacitors across a series connected stack. These range from simple systems which discharge the cells at higher voltages through resistors to more complex active converter systems which equalise the cell voltages through charge redistribution via a power electronic converter. Whilst the simpler schemes are effective they are very inefficient and as such are not suitable for use in many applications. A number of active converter voltage equalisation schemes have been proposed in literature, however, each of these equalisation schemes exhibit flaws which either makes them less desirable or less effective for a broad range of applications. Therefore, a new equalisation converter topology is proposed which is designed for greater equalisation effectiveness, modularity and size. The proposed equalisation converter differs from previously published equalisation schemes by allowing energy transfer between any pair of cells without the cumbersome multi-winding transformers employed in existing equalisation converters. The new equalisation scheme uses a bi-directional arrangement of MOSFET switches for galvanostatic isolation allowing the converter to be multiplexed to the stack. This arrangement allows the total size of the equalisation scheme to be reduced whilst maintaining performance.EPSRC

Optimal Control of Hybrid Systems and Renewable Energies

This book is a collection of papers covering various aspects of the optimal control of power and energy production from renewable resources (wind, PV, biomass, hydrogen, etc.). In particular, attention is focused both on the optimal control of new technologies and on their integration in buildings, microgrids, and energy markets. The examples presented in this book are among the most promising technologies for satisfying an increasing share of thermal and electrical demands with renewable sources: from solar cooling plants to offshore wind generation; hybrid plants, combining traditional and renewable sources, are also considered, as well as traditional and innovative storage systems. Innovative solutions for transportation systems are also explored for both railway infrastructures and advanced light rail vehicles. The optimization and control of new solutions for the power network are addressed in detail: specifically, special attention is paid to microgrids as new paradigms for distribution networks, but also in other applications (e.g., shipboards). Finally, optimization and simulation models within SCADA and energy management systems are considered. This book is intended for engineers, researchers, and practitioners that work in the field of energy, smart grid, renewable resources, and their optimization and control