White Paper UltraBattery : Benefits of a Breakthrough Storage Technology January 2014 Smart Storage Pty Ltd (trading as Ecoult) Suite 402, Grafton Bond Building, 201 Kent Street, Sydney NSW 2000 Australia W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com T +61 2 9241 3001 Ecoult
Abbreviations Used in this Report Abbreviation AC ALABC CSIRO DC DC DoD HEV kw kwh NiMH psoc PV RAPS UPS VRLA Wh Meaning Alternating Current Advanced Lead Acid Battery Consortium Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation To describe efficiency from direct current (DC) input to DC output Depth of Discharge Hybrid Electric Vehicle Kilowatt Kilowatt-hour (energy used in 1 hour by a 1 kw load) Nickel-metal Hydride Partial State-of-Charge Photovoltaic Remote-Area Power Supply Uninterruptible Power Supply Valve-Regulated Lead-Acid Watt-hour (energy used in 1 hour by a 1 W load) Full Technical White Paper Available This paper provides a broad overview of the tests conducted in support of the value proposition of the UltraBattery technology. The most significant results from a decade of in-house and independent testing, with links to original sources, are brought together in a separate, technical White Paper, available from Ecoult. For your free copy of the full technical White Paper, visit ecoult.com or email info@ecoult.com. W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 2
Contents 1. Opportunities for Active Storage Technologies... 4 2. UltraBattery Key Technical Breakthrough... 4 3. UltraBattery Value Proposition: Customer Benefits... 5 4. Research and Testing... 7 5. Proposed Applications of UltraBattery Technology... 14 6. UltraBattery Field Installations... 18 7. Conclusion... 19 8. References... 20 W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 3
1. Opportunities for Active Storage Technologies Energy storage, installed within grids and microgrids, can enhance grid stability and fossil fuel efficiency. Storage also makes it possible to install a higher proportion of renewable energy into the grid, since the inherent fluctuations of such sources can be smoothed out: peaks can be stored and troughs can be filled. To perform these functions, the technology must be able to perform active storage: it must operate continuously, it must be designed for low-rate and high-rate charge and discharge and it must be always available to store or release charge. Ideally it will also provide high efficiency, be available at a low lifetime cost and have proven safe operation and high rates of recyclability. Research shows that on every metric, UltraBattery delivers. This White Paper has been developed by Ecoult in order to identify the unique aspects of UltraBattery technology by bringing together the various scientific tests carried out by major independent laboratories and by UltraBattery manufacturers and system developers around the world. 2. UltraBattery Key Technical Breakthrough During a decade of research and development multiple studies have published results showing UltraBattery to have exceptional performance over conventional lead-acid cells and competing chemistries. The technology is now installed in demonstration and commercial projects globally, performing: + renewable smoothing; + grid ancillary support; and + hybrid electric vehicle power. The fundamental innovation of UltraBattery technology is the introduction of an asymmetric ultracapacitor inside a lead-acid battery (both storage methods using a common electrolyte) in a manner that modifies the behavior of the lead-acid battery chemistry to enhance power management and reduce negative plate sulfation. Figure 1: Schematics of standard lead-acid cell (top left), ultracapacitor (top right) and their combination in the UltraBattery cell (bottom) W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 4
3. UltraBattery Value Proposition: Customer Benefits 1.1. The New Dimension in Lead-Acid UltraBattery technology balances the dependable storage capabilities of lead-acid cells with the quick charge acceptance, power discharge, and longevity of an ultracapacitor. Its performance: + greatly exceeds conventional lead-acid cells across partial State of Charge (psoc) applications; and + matches or exceeds non-lead-acid battery technologies in certain applications (including hybrid electric vehicle use) at a lower lifetime cost. UltraBattery is resistant to many of the typical lead-acid failure modes and its longevity, safety, efficiency, long uptimes, and full recyclability all offer competitive advantages through both revenue gains and environmental benefits. Why UltraBattery? Total lifetime energy throughput capacity, when used in psoc applications, is far beyond previous lead-acid technology leads to lower lifetime cost per kwh Ability to operate continuously in a psoc regime (i.e. operating in a band of charge that is neither totally full nor totally empty) leads to viability of use models where energy is charged and discharged at significantly higher efficiency Enhanced charge acceptance (charge and discharge occur at similar or equal rates, whereas traditional lead-acid cells can discharge quickly but charge more slowly) leads to quicker recharge, increased uptime, and wider applicability Consistency of behavior of individual cells in long strings leads to lower maintenance W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 5
1.2. Safety Lead-acid batteries have been used for well over a century and this familiarity has created a good understanding of safe practices. The UltraBattery has the same safety requirements and benefits as any lead-acid battery. Its electrodes and electrolyte are non-flammable and have fire retarding tendencies. Such is the safety record of DOT/IATA-certified VRLA batteries that as long as they are labelled and the terminals are capped they are not subject to the US Hazardous Materials Regulations, meaning there are no restrictions on their shipment by air or other transportation channels. 1.3. Recyclability Lead-acid batteries of all kinds are virtually 100% recyclable, including the battery s plastic, steel, acid, and lead. Lead-acid batteries have high recycling rates around the world and are the most fully recycled product in many countries, including the USA. The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) states that 96% of all lead-acid batteries in the USA are recycled, and that a typical lead-acid battery contains 60% to 80% recycled lead and plastic. Moreover, while the lead-acid battery supply chain consumes more than 80% of the lead used in the USA, due to extraordinary levels of recycling it is responsible for less than 1% of the country s lead emissions. In Australia, the Australian Bureau of Statistics states that 60% of all lead used in Australia is recycled, and that 93% of all motor vehicle batteries are recycled (Louey, 2010). The European Union document Questions and Answers on the Batteries Directive (2006/66/Ec) states that the collection of industrial and automotive lead-acid batteries in the EU is close to 100%. UltraBattery manufacturer East Penn Manufacturing has developed one of the world s most advanced lead-acid battery recycling facilities, which processes approximately 30,000 used lead-acid batteries per day. + Batteries are collected, dismantled and separated. The lead is smelted, then refined. Sulfur fumes created during the lead smelting are trapped and processed into a liquid fertilizer solution. + The plastic jars, cases and covers are cleaned and ground into polypropylene pellets that are molded into new cases and parts at the company s onsite injection molding facility. + Finally, East Penn s acid reclamation plant recycles approximately 23 million liters (6 million US gallons) of acid per year. The motivations for recycling are both environmental and economic. Production of secondary lead uses approximately one-third of the energy required to produce lead from W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 6
lead ore, so recycling provides significant financial and energy savings as well as reducing requirements for mining and smelting. 4. Research and Testing Three classes of test results make the case for UltraBattery technology: + Firstly, many publicly funded or partially publicly funded laboratories have performed experiments on UltraBattery. The methodologies and results of these tests are generally available online. + Secondly, field results and system outputs are publicly available from UltraBattery installations in hybrid electric vehicle (HEVs) trials and in MW- and kw-scale energy storage projects on grids and microgrids. + Thirdly, manufacturer tests have been continuously carried out in the course of the development of the technology. Some results from these tests have been made publicly available. The three key areas examined by the research have been the UltraBattery cell s: + performance in psoc; + rate of charge acceptance; and + longevity under various working conditions. Most lead-acid batteries have reasonably long lifespans if they are regularly refreshed and properly recharged. However, they generally quickly deteriorate under psoc use (a regime that is generally outside of the design parameters for lead-acid cells). Figure 2: History of lead-acid battery technology W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 7
Figure 2 shows the charge/discharge characteristics of the UltraBattery cell (at right) compared with those of traditional lead-acid technology. In early lead-acid cells, high power was available for brief periods, depth of discharge needed to be quite low, and refresh to full capacity needed to be performed frequently. Later enhancements allowed deep discharge to be performed at increasing rates of charge and discharge, but constant refresh cycles (back to full charge) were still required. Unlike previous lead-acid types, UltraBattery cells can sustain prolonged operation in the psoc range. This range is indicated schematically in the righthand trace in Figure 2. National laboratories in the USA and Australia (including Idaho National Laboratories, Argonne National Laboratory, Sandia National Laboratories, the Advanced Lead Acid Battery Consortium, and CSIRO) have undertaken independent UltraBattery testing programs for both HEV and grid applications. 4.1. Longevity Two organizations (Furukawa Battery and ALABC) have publicly released the results of their tests on UltraBattery cells for HEV use. Both found that UltraBattery could tolerate extremely long periods of use without suffering significant degradation. A driving test carried out on a test circuit in January 2008 used a 144 V module with prototype Furukawa UltraBattery cells installed in a Honda Insight HEV, and a drive of 100,000 miles (160,000 km) was achieved without recovery charging. The UltraBattery cells remained in good condition after the drive (Furukawa & CSIRO, 2008). Of particular significance is that this field driving test demonstrated no difference between the driving performance of the HEV using the UltraBattery pack and that of the HEV using the NiMH battery pack. It has also been shown that the cost of the UltraBattery cells was dramatically less than that of the NiMH cells, and that fuel efficiency and carbon dioxide emissions were similar for the two cell chemistries. In one test, Furukawa set an aggressive target lifespan of 200,000 cycles for the cell. UltraBattery exceeded this sevenfold, achieving 1,400,000 partial charge cycles (over 5,000 full capacity cycles) with no signs of significant degradation. In 2008, Sandia National Laboratories devised tests to examine how UltraBattery cells responded in a simulation of wind smoothing and grid support. Traditional valve-regulated lead-acid (VRLA) batteries were also tested in the same regime. + The traditional VRLA cells dropped below 80% of initial capacity after 1,100 cycles. + UltraBattery lasted about 13 times longer, exceeding 15,000 cycles (Figure 3). W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 8
+ The UltraBattery cell was also able to withstand more than 10 times (1000 vs 100) the number of rapid cycles as compared to the VRLA battery. Figure 3: 2008 Results from Sandia National Laboratories Subsequent to this 2008 Sandia study, Ecoult and its parent company (US battery manufacturer East Penn Manufacturing) have experimented with various aspects of UltraBattery technology to improve the chemistry, hardware, installation techniques, and control and monitoring software for stationary storage applications. (Furukawa Battery Ltd, headquartered in Japan, holds a license to develop HEV and EV solutions.) Improvements made to the UltraBattery cell over the 5 years since 2008 have enhanced its power and energy characteristics while even further reducing its tendency to suffer sulfation in high rate psoc operation. The result has been a significant increase in cell longevity. Figure 4 shows 2013 testing (upper three traces) against the Sandia 2008 tests (lower three traces including the results of a lithium-ion cell tested by Sandia). Figure 4: Sandia National Laboratories tests on VRLA, Li-Ion and UltraBattery technology in 2008 (bottom three traces) are compared with the most recent 2013 internal testing (top three traces). Significant longevity increases have been achieved. W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 9
4.2. High Efficiency Figure 5 shows the results of Furukawa Battery Ltd s tests, which indicate that UltraBattery demonstrates high Wh efficiencies not only for low charge-discharge currents but also for high charge-discharge currents (Furukawa, 2013). Figure 5: Results of efficiency testing undertaken at the Furukawa Battery Company. Note that efficiency drops at high SoC. However, a key component of the value proposition of UltraBattery technology is that it can operate continuously in psoc and rarely needs to enter the low-efficiency range (Furukawa, 2013). Even at peak rates of discharge of 1C (a rate that would discharge the cell s full capacity in one hour) UltraBattery cells typically achieve DC-DC efficiency of 93 95% when performing variability management applications such as regulation services or renewable ramp rate smoothing in a psoc regime. Efficiencies above 85% are seen even in the most challenging high-rate cycles. Efficiency for HEV applications is measured in fuel usage. For example, test results published in 2012 by Idaho National Laboratory describe the performance of a Honda Insight HEV with an UltraBattery pack, used for fleet duties. The vehicle delivers around 44 mpg (5.3 L/100 km) in flattish terrain and approximately 35 mpg (6.7 L/100 km) in hilly terrain. The same test also made positive findings for the lifetime efficiency of the UltraBattery, concluding that an UltraBattery pack installed in a new car would maintain operational capacity for the design life of a modern HEV (INL, 2012). 4.3. Fewer Refresh Charges Lead-acid batteries periodically require a refresh charge, typically at a 1C rate, followed by a lengthy period of lower-rate charging at a float voltage so that all cells reach 100% state of charge. During a refresh cycle, therefore, the battery is not serving the application, so it is desirable to minimize this downtime. W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 10
The UltraBattery requires less frequent refresh cycles than a conventional VRLA battery, and this increases the time it spends on active duty. An East Penn UltraBattery after 40 days without a refresh charge showed performance far exceeding that of traditional VRLA batteries that had gone only seven days without a refresh charge (Figure 6). Figure 6: UltraBattery performance under PV hybrid cycling (adapted from Ferreira, Baca, Hund & Rose, 2012). UltraBattery technology has also been tested with low rates of recovery charging in stationary applications. The cells consistently show capacity ratios equal to or exceeding 100% of initial capacity despite having been cycled many times and only receiving infrequent recovery cycles. 4.4. Less Downtime UltraBattery cells have been shown in numerous tests to require very infrequent refresh charging. Figure 6 shows one test result indicating performance with minimal refresh cycles, and similar findings have been published by Furukawa (2013) and others. Refresh cycles require cells to be removed from duty, so as a direct consequence of requiring fewer refresh cycles, UltraBattery cells spend less time offline. If refreshed for several hours once every 60 days, for example, UltraBattery cells can have downtime of less than 1%, and therefore be available for use more than 99% of the time. Furthermore, strings may be refreshed separately so that there is always storage capacity available in appropriately sized, multi-string systems. W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 11
4.5. High Charge Acceptance When used in a psoc regime performing variability management applications, such as regulation services or renewable ramp rate smoothing, UltraBattery technology has exceptional charge acceptance capability, which is a crucial driver of efficiency. If the voltage rises to the cell s or the pack s upper limit then no further charge can be accepted. In high-rate psoc charge testing (Furukawa 2013) the voltage of a conventional lead-acid battery frequently peaked to the charge terminal voltage, whereas an UltraBattery cell scarcely reached the charge terminal voltage (Figure 7), indicating low internal impedance and good charge acceptance. Figure 7: Discharge terminal voltages during a high-rate psoc cycling test adapted from (Furukawa, 2013). The control battery frequently peaks, indicating that it cannot continue to accept charge. Under the same conditions, UltraBattery cells rarely or never refuse charge. 4.6. Lower Variability of Cell Voltage within Strings Battery packs are made from strings of individual cells connected in series so that their voltage sums to a high enough level for efficient power conversion. Maximizing the suppression of voltage deviations between cells in a string is fundamental to longevity and hence to low lifetime costs. The presence of both the supercapacitor and battery chemistry in a single electrolyte in UltraBattery helps the cells in a string to equalize their voltages and state of charge levels during extended periods of cycling. A direct field comparison of the performance of four lead-acid battery technologies, including the UltraBattery, was undertaken as part of a trial of renewable energy smoothing at Hampton Wind Farm in Australia. Over 10 months, the variability of UltraBattery cell voltages increased by only 32%, while the variability of cell voltages of other lead-acid technologies increased between 140% and 251% (Figure 8). W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 12
Figure 8: Comparison of daily variation of cell voltages over four lead-acid battery technologies after 10 months of operation at a wind farm, in which the UltraBattery (thick blue line) shows much greater stability (CSIRO, 2012). ALABC testing of a Honda Civic HEV retrofitted with an UltraBattery pack and subjected to fleet usage also demonstrated cell voltage stability. After reaching 50,000 miles (80,000 km), the battery pack of this car showed no performance degradation and the individual battery voltages of the pack actually converged as they aged (ALABC, 2013). 4.7. Separate Low-Rate and High-Rate Energy Capacities Typically, when lead-acid batteries are discharged quickly, only a small portion of the total available stored energy can be accessed. Slower discharging allows for the diffusion of the reaction deeper into the plates, utilizing more of the available active material. UltraBattery technology has been shown to extend longevity whether use of the storage is at high rate for power functions or low rate cycling. New Mexico's largest electricity provider, PNM, has installed an UltraBattery storage solution at its Prosperity solar energy technology project. This mixed application combining low-rate (energy) and high-rate (power) use is designed to better manage: + the misalignment between PV output and utility distribution grid and system peaks; and + intermittency and the volatile ramp rates of renewable energy sources that cause voltage fluctuations. W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 13
5. Proposed Applications of UltraBattery Technology 5.1. UltraBattery Use Case in Proposed Applications For all proposed applications, UltraBattery excels due to: + performance in continuous psoc; + high rates of charge and discharge; + performance in low-rate energy shifting applications; and + low lifetime cost (a factor of upfront costs, long uptime periods, and longevity). These fundamental strengths of UltraBattery are well documented in published research and testing. Ecoult s full technical White Paper describes these tests in more detail. W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 14
5.2. Frequency Regulation Electricity grid operators must constantly maintain the balance between electricity supply and demand. At any one time a number of generators on the grid are assigned the role of frequency regulation, receiving a control signal from the power system operator to increase or decrease their output so that the supply demand balance and frequency are maintained. While generators are paid to provide frequency regulation services, the role requires a fossil fuel generator to operate below its most efficient output and inhibits its ability to earn maximum energy revenue. Furthermore, the rapid response that is required for frequency regulation is beyond the ramp rate capability of fossil generators beginning from a cold start, hence they sit running in spinning reserve. Figure 9 shows a sample of system output from an UltraBattery installation providing frequency regulation at PJM Interconnection, the largest of 10 Regional Transmission Organizations/Independent System Operators in the USA. Small surges of power are continuously either supplied or absorbed by the frequency regulation solution to meet the instantaneous needs of the grid. Figure 9: Regulation services on the PJM grid UltraBattery technology responds rapidly and can ramp much faster than any conventional generator, following the regulation control signal accurately and providing a better service to the system operator. 5.3. Smoothing and Ramp-Rate Control There is limited scope to connect renewable energy sources directly to the grid, as the inherent variability of the source makes renewables unsuitable to maintain a steady power output. Energy storage is an excellent method for ramp-rate management, because only a small energy storage capacity is required compared to the peak renewable power generated. Ramp-rate control is equally applicable to large-scale and small-scale renewable generation systems. W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 15
The Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) in the USA has published detailed information and system outputs for an UltraBattery solar smoothing and shifting project installed in the PNM grid. For details, search for Ecoult on the EPRI website (epri.com). 5.4. Power Quality Electric power provided to customers should fulfill a range of power quality requirements for the benefit of both customers and the distribution networks that deliver the power. Important elements in power quality include filtering harmonic content, voltage regulation, phase balancing, power factor correction, and voltage sag. Battery energy storage systems designed to operate in psoc are particularly suited to managing power quality because they have the potential to manipulate the AC waveform in sophisticated ways to improve power quality measures. If the storage technology can provide both high- and low-rate charge delivery, as UltraBattery can, then power quality functions can be performed by a dual-purpose system that is primarily installed with another purpose in mind. So an UltraBattery storage solution providing network peak shifting, or providing industrial or residential energy management, could be simultaneously earning revenue selling power-quality services to the grid operator. 5.5. Spinning Reserve Reserve capacity for shorter timescales, which must be available when needed within minutes or even seconds, needs to be kept spinning if provided by fossil-fuel generators so that it is ready to ramp up rapidly. However, while operating as spinning reserve, fuel-based generators will suffer inefficiencies and incur high operating costs due to fuel consumption and wear and tear. There is also the opportunity cost of lost energy revenue while their output is held at a level that is much lower than their nameplate capacity. UltraBattery has a high-rate charge/discharge capacity and is well suited to performing or offsetting spinning reserve functions on the grid. 5.6. Residential Energy Management Residential electricity production has recently become quite commonplace. The electricity grid (designed to deliver energy from source to load) often now has to manage domestic loads that alternate between load and generator depending on the sun. Localized cloud cover can see available power drop with steep ramp rates in areas with high rooftop PV W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 16
penetration. UltraBattery is already being used for community-level kw-scale projects - examples are given in Section 6 below. 5.7. Energy Shifting and Demand Management Peak demand management by energy shifting can be desirable in a variety of circumstances on the electricity network. Growth of peak demand has been a longstanding phenomenon globally, particularly due to increasing use of air conditioning, increasing house sizes and population growth. UltraBattery is suitable as an energy shifting technology because its charge/discharge characteristics make it a multipurpose storage technology able to perform valuable grid support services on a second-by-second timescale as well as performing longer term energy shifting over hours and days. 5.8. Diesel Efficiencies In a diesel/renewable microgrid, energy storage is used to absorb rapid changes in both renewable energy output and system demand, so the diesel generators are exposed only to a slowly changing operating regime. With appropriate storage in place the diesel generator operates far more efficiently as it does not need to operate at low load (i.e. as spinning reserve) since the storage can cover moments when the renewable energy output drops suddenly. 5.9. Multipurpose for Data Centers and Buildings Data centers are large electricity users and they usually have an existing energy storage resource in the form of a battery backup system. These storage systems typically use traditional lead-acid batteries which must be held on float current (full charge). Nevertheless, data centers are already grid-connected and (if active storage devices are installed) present an opportunity to provide services to the grid including frequency, voltage, or power quality regulation services as well as demand management. UltraBattery storage units are fully compatible with traditional UPS batteries in data centers, and can operate in continuous charge and discharge to provide grid services, offering a new source of revenue for what is today a cost only investment for data center operators. The widespread presence of backup energy in data centers today presents a substantial potential buffer for the grid, and an enormously valuable, already-existing resource that UltraBattery technology can unlock to support variability management and accelerated renewable integration. W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 17
5.10. Hybrid Electric Vehicles (HEV) Several public-domain UltraBattery test programs have targeted HEV applications, with published field results showing UltraBattery cells to be well suited to HEV installation due to their ability to accept and release charge at high rates, operate in continuous psoc and deliver long periods of service without refresh charging. The ability to work in constant continuous psoc is crucial for HEV energy storage, where braking and acceleration occur in rapid repetition. UltraBattery technology shows comparable performance (in miles per gallon terms) to that of a vehicle of the same model powered by NiMH batteries, at significantly lower cost (ALABC, 2013). 6. UltraBattery Field Installations In real-world HEV use, UltraBattery cells have outperformed both traditional lead-acid cells and competing storage technologies. Grid-scale projects have also been installed in the USA, Japan and Australia. Some UltraBattery field installations are listed below. Table 1 shows images of selected installations. Table 1: Current projects showing the range of applications suited to UltraBattery technology UltraBattery FIELD INSTALLATIONS Application Location Highlight HEV in courier fleet operation MW-scale smoothing of PV solar energy plant MW-scale grid regulation services MW-scale microgrid storage and control kw-scale building storage kw-scale load leveling Arizona, USA New Mexico, USA Pennsylvania, USA King Island, Australia Japan Japan 5,000 driving miles per month with very little cell degradation Smoothing ramp rates of 136 kw per second and shifting energy from midday to evening peak 3 MW storage performing frequency and voltage regulation on the grid of PJM Interconnection 3 MW storage performing hybrid microgrid (wind, solar, diesel) support including high-penetration renewable functions Shimizu Corporation 500 Ah smart building application Furukawa factory 10 kw facility peak shifting application kw-scale load leveling Kitakyushu, Japan 300 kw smart grid demonstration kw-scale community storage Kitakyushu, Japan Two projects within Kitakyushu Museum of Natural History and Human History: 10 kw and 100 kw facility peak shifting applications W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 18
7. Conclusion A wide range of tests and installations have demonstrated that the UltraBattery is a highly capable and long-lasting multipurpose energy storage technology. The tests have been performed by government laboratories and through collaborations between organizations. Much of the data is available in the public domain. Many reports and system outputs from UltraBattery installations are also available online. Research, testing, and installation of UltraBattery technology continue, and the value of this breakthrough technology is rapidly becoming better understood by energy experts and energy storage customers around the world. Summaries of many results and outputs are also available in the full technical White Paper published by Ecoult and available on Ecoult s website (ecoult.com). The full technical White Paper assembles some of the significant publicly available test data in support of the key benefits of the UltraBattery technology, in particular, long life, high efficiency, few refresh cycles, high charge acceptance, and cell voltage stability. W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 19
8. References ALABC, 2013. ALABC UltraBattery Hybrid Surpasses 100,000 Miles of Fleet Duty. Press Release, 6 May 2013. Durham: The Advanced Lead-Acid Battery Consortium. Available at http://www.alabc.org/press-releases/pr_alabc_ub_civic_100k_060513.pdf. CSIRO, 2012. UltraBattery Energy Storage System for Hampton Wind Farm Field Trial: Summary of Activities and Outcomes. Contract report to Smart Storage Pty Ltd (t/a Ecoult). Canberra: Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation. Ferreira, S. Baca, W. Hund, T. & Rose, D. 2012. Life Cycle Testing and Evaluation of Energy Storage Devices. Albuquerque: Sandia National Laboratories. Available at http://www.sandia.gov/ess/docs/pr_conferences/2012/papers/friday/session1/03_ferreira_ PeerReview_Print.pdf. Furukawa, 2013. Development of UltraBattery. Furukawa Review, no. 43. Furukawa Electric Company Ltd. Available at http://www.furukawa.co.jp/review/fr043/fr43_02.pdf. Furukawa & CSIRO, 2008. Development of UltraBattery : 3rd Report. Furukawa Electric Company Ltd. Available at www.furukawadenchi.co.jp/english/research/new/pdf/ultra_03.pdf. INL, 2012. Development and Testing of an UltraBattery -Equipped Honda Civic Hybrid. Idaho Falls: Idaho National Laboratory. Available at http://www.inl.gov/technicalpublications/documents/5680924.pdf. Louey, R. 2010. Recycling of automotive lead-acid batteries. Melbourne: CSIRO Australia. W www.ecoult.com www.ultrabattery.com E info@ecoult.com UltraBattery White Paper 20