World's Biggest Battery Switched On in Alaska

windowpain writes "An article in the London Telegraph describes a 2,000 square meter 13,730 cell NiCad UPS that will provide backup power for the entire city of Fairbanks for up to seven minutes. 'This is enough time, according to ABB, to start up diesel generators to restore power, an important safeguard since at such low temperatures, water pipes can freeze entirely in two hours.' Now if they can just remember to keep it plugged in." Update: 08/28 14:58 GMT by M : A reader notes that the battery has enough juice for 12,000 people for seven minutes, and the city of Fairbanks has a population of over 80,000, so they couldn't keep the whole city powered up for even a minute.

Comments

And the contract goes to...

[runswithd6s]

...the cheapest bid. Don't forget that Cities and Municipalities operate on a budget, and although Flywheel Energy Storage units may have been more environment friendly and cheaper for long-term maintenance, they were probably far more expensive up-front. Long-term financing isn't often a concern for short-term problems, so my guess is that the 2k sq. ft. battery was the cheapest.

Re:7 minutes? yeah right....more like a waste of m

[Orne]

Its a problem of electronics. If I run a power plant, chances are I have digital displays, fuel conveyors, sensors, etc all electrically powered. If the plants running, you can use that energy to power yourself. If not, normal operating assumptions are that you have an outside power source supplying plant load at least long enough for your generator to start. In the case of a total blackout, you don't have that luxury.

Now, we can't help that your town can't start a diesel generator in less than two hours. A properly maintained diesel unit should be up running at full output (say 8 MW) at 60 Hz in 30 seconds. Using that energy, we can supply electricity to a larger plant so they can run their controls, and get them going. Your average combustion turbine can start in 5 minutes, and can provide say 50 MW of power. You now have enough energy for 45,000+ people. A small fossil fuel plant can cold start in a couple hours, generates 600 MW, enough for say 550,000 people.

Re:Why NiCads???

[Zarquon]

Because nicads can deliver greater currents than equivalent NiMH? When delivering full capacity in 7 minutes, you want something with a low internal resistance.

And please note that NiCADs have shown exactly _one_ verified situation that will cause the memory effect: Satellites. The batteries have to be discharged to _exactly_ the same level over and over to show the memory effect.

Most NiCADs suffer from overheating, overcharging, and simple wear and tear (most consumer batteries are designed for ~500-1000 cycles; and deep discharging actually makes things worse!)

NiCADs do have better energy density than most SLAs, but usually in bulk SLAs are much cheaper. NiCADs also have a much higher self-discharge rate. It would be interesting to see the Cost/Benefit analysis.