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Concerted action on battery control and management in photovoltaic systems

Objective

The objective of this concerted action is to identify the problems encountered with battery operation in PV systems and to develop a strategy for their control and management.
An advanced charger has been developed for batteries in photovoltaic (PV) systems by identifying the problems which should be solved, examining the design of chargers on the market and evaluating charge control criteria. Practical proposals have been developed for improvements in battery charge control, applicable to PV plants of all sizes.
A prototype was made available on 04/30/92

The development of an advanced battery charger for photovoltaic applications was approached by, firstly identifying the battery problems which should be solved, secondly analyzing the design of chargers on the market and identifying improvements, thirdly testing design improvements in the laboratory, and finally by recommending improvements and disseminating this information to industry.

The main improvements recommended were:
2-stage charging should be used (the battery should be charged to a higher threshold voltage for a fixed period, after which the threshold voltage should be dropped by 0.2 V);
the upper and lower cut off voltages should be both temperature and current sensitive;
in large batteries, individual cells, or blocks of cells, should be monitored;
battery cell equalisers should be used to automatically maintain charge equalisation (an electronic unit has been successfully developed and demonstrated for this purpose).
The most common problems found in PV systems to date have been problems associated with batteries. The battery in a PV system should require minimum maintenance and have a lifetime of approximately 8 years. Practical experience from the EC PV pilot plants show that existing PV systems cannot meet this requirement. The principle problems encountered are inadequate battery design and operation, low load supply reliability and premature battery failure (after 4-5 years of operation).

The work of this concerted action is focused upon three areas:

- The compilation of a handbook for batteries in PV systems. The handbook is designed to help PV plant managers, PV designers and suppliers to the PV industry.
- Providing practical assistance to the PV pilot plants in order to improve their batteries performance and increase their lifetime.
- Coordinating experiments in the PV pilot plants. Assistance will be provided in experimental design and data evaluation.
- Dissemination of information to PV designers, PV researchers, PV users and the battery industry.

This project identifies battery problems in PV systems, examines the causes of these problems and provides recommendations of their resolution. It provides designers of charge controllers and PV systems with suggested system improvements. It also provides battery manufacturers with detailed description of stresses which occur within batteries in PV systems. These points should be considered when designing or selecting batteries for PV applications.

Fields of science

Programme(s)

Topic(s)

Data not available

Call for proposal

Data not available

Funding Scheme

CSC - Cost-sharing contracts

Coordinator

Hyperion Energy Systems Ltd.
EU contribution
No data
Address
Main Street
120 Watergrasshill
Ireland

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Total cost
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Participants (3)

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Last update: 10 July 2012

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Permalink: https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/JOUR0038

European Union, 2024