Assessing the potential of nanoscopic meadows in driving electric cars

A report has highlighted that nanoscale meadows of grass and flowers could hold the key to increasing the amount of energy that can be stored in ultracapacitors, devices tipped to replace batteries in high-demand applications like electric cars.

The approach adopoted by Hao Zhang at the Research Institute of Chemical Defence in Beijing, China, and colleagues at Peking University is as follows: It is being said that this purpose can be served by creating nanoscale meadows of fuzzy flowers of manganese oxide (MnO), a material with a much greater capacity for ions than activated carbon.

The usually resistant MnO can be charged up to attract the ions it can store so well, and consequently the nano-meadow performs 10 times better than MnO alone. The nanomeadow's complex structure is resistant to the mechanical degradation that reduces the performance of ultracapacitors over time. The energy capacity of the new device drops by just three percent after 20,000 charge and discharge cycles, better than other high-capacity designs.

According to NewScientist.com, Mike Barnes at the University of Manchester, UK, says this is an interesting approach to improving ultracapacitor performance. But he points out that that a design ready for market needs to be even more resistant to physical degradation. In vehicles, ultracapacitors are charged during braking, which might happen about 60 times per hour in urban situations.

Plug Power to integrate Maxwell’s ultracapacitors into its fuel cell systems

Plug Power Inc. has selected Maxwell’s Boostcap ultracapacitors to enhance performance and energy management in its line of GenDrive power units.

The company, an integrator of fuel cell-based power solutions for zero-emission material handling vehicles, has finalised a purchase order for Maxwell’s Boostcap MC2600 2,600-farad ultracapacitor cells.

According to Maxwell, the combination of technologies is another example of the synergy between hydrogen fuel cells’ extended energy output and ultracapacitors’ short duration burst power capabilities.

Andy Marsh, president and chief executive officer, Plug Power Inc. said that GenDrive power units provide a high-efficiency, low-maintenance “drop-in” replacement for lead-acid battery packs in electric lift trucks. The GenDrive system delivers enhanced productivity by eliminating the downtime associated with the changing and charging of lead-acid batteries.

On decision to integrate Maxwell’s ultracapacitors into its fuel cell systems, Marsh said ultracapacitors’ burst power capabilities for lifting, as well as regenerative braking for energy recuperation and longer operating life make them an ideal complement to hydrogen fuel cells in this application.

CapComp to distribute EDLC product in Europe

CapComp GmbH has introduced a new Electric Double Layer Capacitor (EDLC) type ESHSR-0360C0-002R7A in Europe.

The product is manufactured by NESSCAP Ltd. Korea. CapComp has gained the distribution rights for the same from the Korean company for Germany, Austria and Switzerland. The German company added that it also open to enquiries from East and Western Europe.

According to the company, the product has a nominal capacitance of 360F /2.7V and is available in radial housing. Internal resistance (ESR) is specified with 3.2 milli-Ohm. 4 Snap-In contacts avoid incorrect polarity and improve mechanical stability on a PCB. The product is working in an operational temperature range of – 40°C ~ +65°C and manufactured according to RoHS standards.

CamComp highlighted that ultra capacitors in combination with batteries are opening new application areas for optimised mobile energy concepts.

The main applications are as follows: Un-interruptible power supply (UPS); security feature in Wind Turbines; board-net stabilisation in automotive application; energy recuperation; maintenance-free battery-replacement solution.

For specifications, click here:

http://www.capcomp.de/fileadmin/document_download/NESSCAP_Specifications/2_Snap-in_Type/EDLC_360F_-_2_7V_A.pdf

Chinese bus manufacturer chooses Maxwell’s ultracapacitors

Maxwell Technologies has completed delivery of 720 of its 48-volt multi-cell Boostcap ultracapacitor modules to Xiamen Golden Dragon Bus Co., Ltd. for installation into 45 hybrid buses.

For its part, Xiamen Golden Dragon Bus, which sells large-and-medium-sized luxury buses and light vans under the trade mark of Golden Dragon, is producing diesel-electric hybrid buses for Hangzhou Public Transport Group Co., Ltd.

On the development, Golden Dragon’s Hybrid Bus Program Engineer George Dong said that the 48-volt Boostcap module gives the company a versatile building block for easy integration into various high-voltage configurations for heavy vehicles.

Golden Dragon delivered the first prototype hybrid bus with an ultracapacitor-based energy storage system to Hangzhou in July 2007, for comparison with other hybrid drive systems under actual operating conditions.

According to Maxwell, Boostcap modules meet transportation industry requirements for watt-hours
of energy storage and watts of power delivery per kilogram, and are designed to perform reliably through one million or more deep discharge cycles, or about 10 years of operational life for most vehicles.

For Maxwell, the revenue of Boostcap ultracapacitor increased by 76 percent to $6.8 million in the second quarter, compared with $3.9 million for the same period last year.

In the recent past, the company had also received an order from Vossloh Kiepe GmbH, a producer of heavy vehicle drive systems, for 300 125-volt Boostcap ultracapacitor modules for emission-free electric trolley buses it is producing in collaboration with Van Hool NV for the Milan, Italy, municipal transit system.

Enable IPC makes progress with its ultracapacitor nanotechnology

Enable IPC (Intellectual Property Commercialization) Corp. is gearing up for the first commercial use of its ultracapacitor nanotechnology.

The company has partnered with Spain’s IMDEA Energy Institute to jointly develop ultracapacitors based on Enable IPC’s patent-pending energy technology.

The initial project for this venture will be related to incorporation of Enable IPC’s ultracapacitor into the SA2VE clean energy innovation programme.

Under the new partnership, IMDEA Energy will work directly with Spanish company Green Power and a national lab in Spain known as CEDEX, while Enable IPC will provide enhanced ultracapacitor electrodes to the organisation for integration into a new power conditioning unit.

Manuel Romero, deputy director of IMDEA Energy Institute, which focuses on energy-related R&D, said the decision to go ahead with such partnership is based on numerous improvements that Enable IPC’s process produced over today’s current market-ready ultracapacitors.

For its part, Enable IPC claims that its ultracapacitor technology has already matched or exceeded the cycle life of commercially-available devices.

“As a point of reference, many rechargeable batteries have a useful life in the 1000s of cycles. That is, you can charge and discharge them at most a few thousand times before they are no longer useful,” according to researcher Kevin Leonard, one of the inventors of the Enable IPC ultracapacitor. “Ultracapacitors, on the other hand, can generally be charged and discharged hundreds of thousands of times.”

In its laboratory testing in December last year, Enable IPC’s ultracapacitor had surpassed one million cycles while still maintaining over 80 percent of its initial capacity, which according to Leonard, matches some of the best performance reports the company has seen in ultracapacitor life cycle testing.