ULISES: AUTONOMOUS MOBILE ROBOT USING ULTRACAPACITORS-STORAGE ENERGY SYSTEM.

摘要

Recent technology improvements enabled ultracapacitors (UCaps) to be an interesting option for short-term power applications, such as in industry, automotive and traction drives, regenerative energy system, telecommunication and medical equipment. UCaps are being developed as an alternative to pulse batteries. To be an attractive alternative, ultracapacitors must have at least one order of magnitude higher power and a much longer shelf and cycle life than batteries. UCaps have much lower energy density than batteries and their low energy density is, in most cases, the factor that determines the feasibility of their use in a particular power application. The main advantages of UCaps are that they can provide high power capability (60-120s is typical), excellent reversibility (90-95% or higher) and long cycle life (>105 cycles). Thus they exhibit 20-200times larger capacitance per unit volume or mass than conventional capacitors. In this paper, an autonomous mobile robot was converted from a conventional lead-acid or lithium-ion battery to an ultracapacitors as the power source. The integration of UCaps as element of energy storage on the robot was studied with the main of optimizing the energetic solution. The design of the ultracapacitors based power supply system is outlined.