Data storage system for wireless sensor networks

Dissertação de mestrado, Engenharia Informática, Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia, Universidade do Algarve, 2015

Development of solar air heaters & thermal energy storage system for drying applications in food processing industries

In the present work, the author has designed and developed all types of solar air heaters called porous and nonporous collectors. The developed solar air heaters were subjected to different air mass flow rates in order to standardize the flow per unit area of the collector. Much attention was given to investigate the performance of the solar air heaters fitted with baffles. The output obtained from the experiments on pilot models, helped the installation of solar air heating system for industrial drying applications also. Apart from these, various types of solar dryers, for small and medium scale drying applications, were also built up. The feasibility of ‘latent heat thermal energy storage system’ based on Phase Change Material was also undertaken. The application of solar greenhouse for drying industrial effluent was analyzed in the present study and a solar greenhouse was developed. The effectiveness of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) in the field of solar air heaters was also analyzed. The thesis is divided into eight chapters.

Improved low-voltage-ride-through capability of fixed-speed wind turbines using decentralised control of STATCOM with energy storage system

The design and implementation of a new control scheme for reactive power compensation, voltage regulation and transient stability enhancement for wind turbines equipped with fixed-speed induction generators (IGs) in large interconnected power systems is presented in this study. The low-voltage-ride-through (LVRT) capability is provided by extending the range of the operation of the controlled system to include typical post-fault conditions. A systematic procedure is proposed to design decentralised multi-variable controllers for large interconnected power systems using the linear quadratic (LQ) output-feedback control design method and the controller design procedure is formulated as an optimisation problem involving rank-constrained linear matrix inequality (LMI). In this study, it is shown that a static synchronous compensator (STATCOM) with energy storage system (ESS), controlled via robust control technique, is an effective device for improving the LVRT capability of fixed-speed wind turbines.

Development of a microgrid with renewable energy sources and electrochemical storage system integration

Beside the traditional paradigm of "centralized" power generation, a new concept of "distributed" generation is emerging, in which the same user becomes pro-sumer. During this transition, the Energy Storage Systems (ESS) can provide multiple services and features, which are necessary for a higher quality of the electrical system and for the optimization of non-programmable Renewable Energy Source (RES) power plants. A ESS prototype was designed, developed and integrated into a renewable energy production system in order to create a smart microgrid and consequently manage in an efficient and intelligent way the energy flow as a function of the power demand. The produced energy can be introduced into the grid, supplied to the load directly or stored in batteries. The microgrid is composed by a 7 kW wind turbine (WT) and a 17 kW photovoltaic (PV) plant are part of. The load is given by electrical utilities of a cheese factory. The ESS is composed by the following two subsystems, a Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) and a Power Control System (PCS). With the aim of sizing the ESS, a Remote Grid Analyzer (RGA) was designed, realized and connected to the wind turbine, photovoltaic plant and the switchboard. Afterwards, different electrochemical storage technologies were studied, and taking into account the load requirements present in the cheese factory, the most suitable solution was identified in the high temperatures salt Na-NiCl2 battery technology. The data acquisition from all electrical utilities provided a detailed load analysis, indicating the optimal storage size equal to a 30 kW battery system. Moreover a container was designed and realized to locate the BESS and PCS, meeting all the requirements and safety conditions. Furthermore, a smart control system was implemented in order to handle the different applications of the ESS, such as peak shaving or load levelling.

LoneStar : Design and evaluation of an energy-efficient, disk-based archival storage system

Bandlaufwerke waren bisher die vorherrschende Technologie, um die anfallenden Datenmengen in Archivsystemen zu speichern. Mit Zugriffsmustern, die immer aktiver werden, und Speichermedien wie Festplatten die kostenmäßig aufholen, muss die Architektur vor Speichersystemen zur Archivierung neu überdacht werden. Zuverlässigkeit, Integrität und Haltbarkeit sind die Haupteigenschaften der digitalen Archivierung. Allerdings nimmt auch die Zugriffsgeschwindigkeit einen erhöhten Stellenwert ein, wenn aktive Archive ihre gesamten Inhalte für den direkten Zugriff bereitstellen. Ein band-basiertes System kann die hierfür benötigte Parallelität, Latenz und Durchsatz nicht liefern, was in der Regel durch festplattenbasierte Systeme als Zwischenspeicher kompensiert wird.rnIn dieser Arbeit untersuchen wir die Herausforderungen und Möglichkeiten ein festplattenbasiertes Speichersystem zu entwickeln, das auf eine hohe Zuverlässigkeit und Energieeffizienz zielt und das sich sowohl für aktive als auch für kalte Archivumgebungen eignet. Zuerst analysieren wir die Speichersysteme und Zugriffsmuster eines großen digitalen Archivs und präsentieren damit ein mögliches Einsatzgebiet für unsere Architektur. Daraufhin stellen wir Mechanismen vor um die Zuverlässigkeit einer einzelnen Festplatte zu verbessern und präsentieren sowie evaluieren einen neuen, energieeffizienten, zwei- dimensionalen RAID Ansatz der für „Schreibe ein Mal, lese mehrfach“ Zugriffe optimiert ist. Letztlich stellen wir Protokollierungs- und Zwischenspeichermechanismen vor, die die zugrundeliegenden Ziele unterstützen und evaluieren das RAID System in einer Dateisystemumgebung.

Pigment data set from the SeaWiFS Bio-optical Archive and Storage System (1961-1996)

The oceans play a critical role in the Earth's climate, but unfortunately, the extent of this role is only partially understood. One major obstacle is the difficulty associated with making high-quality, globally distributed observations, a feat that is nearly impossible using only ships and other ocean-based platforms. The data collected by satellite-borne ocean color instruments, however, provide environmental scientists a synoptic look at the productivity and variability of the Earth's oceans and atmosphere, respectively, on high-resolution temporal and spatial scales. Three such instruments, the Sea-viewing Wide Field-of-view Sensor (SeaWiFS) onboard ORBIMAGE's OrbView-2 satellite, and two Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometers (MODIS) onboard the National Aeronautic and Space Administration's (NASA) Terra and Aqua satellites, have been in continuous operation since September 1997, February 2000, and June 2002, respectively. To facilitate the assembly of a suitably accurate data set for climate research, members of the NASA Sensor Intercomparison and Merger for Biological and Interdisciplinary Oceanic Studies (SIMBIOS) Project and SeaWiFS Project Offices devote significant attention to the calibration and validation of these and other ocean color instruments. This article briefly presents results from the SIMBIOS and SeaWiFS Project Office's (SSPO) satellite ocean color validation activities and describes the SeaWiFS Bio-optical Archive and Storage System (SeaBASS), a state-of-the-art system for archiving, cataloging, and distributing the in situ data used in these activities.

Effect of hen age, egg weight and storage system on physical properties of egg from white-egg laying hens

A total of 72 eggs from a group of 100 white laying hens housed in standard cages were analyzed. Thirty-six eggs were retired when the hens had 44 week of age and the other 36 eggs were retired eight weeks afterwards. Each group of 36 eggs was radomly divided in three groups of 12 eggs. First group was analyzed at once (storage system C); second one was kept during one week in the refrigerator (5ºC) (storage system R), and third group were kept also one week but on ambient temperature (25ºC) (storage system ET). The hen age, egg weight and storage system had not significant (P>0.05) effect on shell thickness. The specific gravity (SG) has a positive relation with shell quality. The egg class and storage system significantly (P<0,05) affected to SG, while no influence of bird age on this variable was observed. The yolk color increased with hen age but storage system had not effect on this variable. The increase of the hen age and the R and AT storage systems significantly (P<0.05) reduced albumen height (H) and the interaction hen age x storage system was significant (P<0.025) for this variable. The reduction of the H due to R and ET storage systems was higher in the eggs from hens with 52 weeks of age than in those from hens with 44 weeks of age. The Haugh units (HU) was significantly (P<0.05) affected by hen age, egg class and storage system. The hen age increase reduced HU and the R and ET eggs had lower HU than C eggs. It is concluded that the bird age and storage system with high temperatures reduced the egg quality.

Effect of bird age and storage system on physical properties of eggs from brown laying hens

A total of 108 eggs from a group of 100 brown laying hens housed in standard cages were analyzed. Thirty-six eggs were retired when the hens had 30 week of age, other 36 eggs were retired when the hens had 35 week of age and the remaining 36 eggs were retired five weeks afterwards. Each group of 36 eggs was radomly divided in three groups of 12 eggs. First group was analyzed at once, second group one was kept during one week in the refrigerator (5°C) and third group was kept also one week but on ambient temperature (25°C). Shell color, shell thickness, specific gravity, albumen height and Haugh units wre obtained. The bird age had significant effect on shell color and shell thickness, but the storage system had not influence on such variables. The hen age had not effect on specific gravity, but the storage system affected to this variable. Hen age and storage system had significant influence (P<0.05) on albumen height and Haugh units, and the interaction age × storage system was significant for these variables. The specific gravity had positive relations with shell thickness, yolk color, albumen height and Haugh units. It is concluded that bird age and storage system under high temperatures reduced the egg quality.

Concept analysis; offshore breakwater-oil storage system /

Mode of access: Internet.

Control of second-life hybrid battery energy storage system based on modular boost-multilevel buck converter

To fully utilize second-life batteries on the grid system, a hybrid battery scheme needs to be considered for several reasons: the uncertainty over using a single source supply chain for second-life batteries, the differences in evolving battery chemistry and battery configuration by different suppliers to strive for greater power levels, and the uncertainty of degradation within a second-life battery. Therefore, these hybrid battery systems could have widely different module voltage, capacity, and initial state of charge and state of health. In order to suitably integrate and control these widely different batteries, a suitable multimodular converter topology and an associated control structure are required. This paper addresses these issues proposing a modular boost-multilevel buck converter based topology to integrate these hybrid second-life batteries to a grid-tie inverter. Thereafter, a suitable module-based distributed control architecture is introduced to independently utilize each converter module according to its characteristics. The proposed converter and control architecture are found to be flexible enough to integrate widely different batteries to an inverter dc link. Modeling, analysis, and experimental validation are performed on a single-phase modular hybrid battery energy storage system prototype to understand the operation of the control strategy with different hybrid battery configurations.

Analysis and design of power management scheme for an on-board solar energy storage system

This paper investigates the power management issues in a mobile solar energy storage system. A multi-converter based energy storage system is proposed, in which solar power is the primary source while the grid or the diesel generator is selected as the secondary source. The existence of the secondary source facilitates the battery state of charge detection by providing a constant battery charging current. Converter modeling, multi-converter control system design, digital implementation and experimental verification are introduced and discussed in details. The prototype experiment indicates that the converter system can provide a constant charging current during solar converter maximum power tracking operation, especially during large solar power output variation, which proves the feasibility of the proposed design. © 2014 IEEE.

A multi-modular second life hybrid battery energy storage system for utility grid applications

The modern grid system or the smart grid is likely to be populated with multiple distributed energy sources, e.g. wind power, PV power, Plug-in Electric Vehicle (PEV). It will also include a variety of linear and nonlinear loads. The intermittent nature of renewable energies like PV, wind turbine and increased penetration of Electric Vehicle (EV) makes the stable operation of utility grid system challenging. In order to ensure a stable operation of the utility grid system and to support smart grid functionalities such as, fault ride-through, frequency response, reactive power support, and mitigation of power quality issues, an energy storage system (ESS) could play an important role. A fast acting bidirectional energy storage system which can rapidly provide and absorb power and/or VARs for a sufficient time is a potentially valuable tool to support this functionality. Battery energy storage systems (BESS) are one of a range suitable energy storage system because it can provide and absorb power for sufficient time as well as able to respond reasonably fast. Conventional BESS already exist on the grid system are made up primarily of new batteries. The cost of these batteries can be high which makes most BESS an expensive solution. In order to assist moving towards a low carbon economy and to reduce battery cost this work aims to research the opportunities for the re-use of batteries after their primary use in low and ultra-low carbon vehicles (EV/HEV) on the electricity grid system. This research aims to develop a new generation of second life battery energy storage systems (SLBESS) which could interface to the low/medium voltage network to provide necessary grid support in a reliable and in cost-effective manner. The reliability/performance of these batteries is not clear, but is almost certainly worse than a new battery. Manufacturers indicate that a mixture of gradual degradation and sudden failure are both possible and failure mechanisms are likely to be related to how hard the batteries were driven inside the vehicle. There are several figures from a number of sources including the DECC (Department of Energy and Climate Control) and Arup and Cenex reports indicate anything from 70,000 to 2.6 million electric and hybrid vehicles on the road by 2020. Once the vehicle battery has degraded to around 70-80% of its capacity it is considered to be at the end of its first life application. This leaves capacity available for a second life at a much cheaper cost than a new BESS Assuming a battery capability of around 5-18kWhr (MHEV 5kWh - BEV 18kWh battery) and approximate 10 year life span, this equates to a projection of battery storage capability available for second life of >1GWhrs by 2025. Moreover, each vehicle manufacturer has different specifications for battery chemistry, number and arrangement of battery cells, capacity, voltage, size etc. To enable research and investment in this area and to maximize the remaining life of these batteries, one of the design challenges is to combine these hybrid batteries into a grid-tie converter where their different performance characteristics, and parameter variation can be catered for and a hot swapping mechanism is available so that as a battery ends it second life, it can be replaced without affecting the overall system operation. This integration of either single types of batteries with vastly different performance capability or a hybrid battery system to a grid-tie 3 energy storage system is different to currently existing work on battery energy storage systems (BESS) which deals with a single type of battery with common characteristics. This thesis addresses and solves the power electronic design challenges in integrating second life hybrid batteries into a grid-tie energy storage unit for the first time. This study details a suitable multi-modular power electronic converter and its various switching strategies which can integrate widely different batteries to a grid-tie inverter irrespective of their characteristics, voltage levels and reliability. The proposed converter provides a high efficiency, enhanced control flexibility and has the capability to operate in different operational modes from the input to output. Designing an appropriate control system for this kind of hybrid battery storage system is also important because of the variation of battery types, differences in characteristics and different levels of degradations. This thesis proposes a generalised distributed power sharing strategy based on weighting function aims to optimally use a set of hybrid batteries according to their relative characteristics while providing the necessary grid support by distributing the power between the batteries. The strategy is adaptive in nature and varies as the individual battery characteristics change in real time as a result of degradation for example. A suitable bidirectional distributed control strategy or a module independent control technique has been developed corresponding to each mode of operation of the proposed modular converter. Stability is an important consideration in control of all power converters and as such this thesis investigates the control stability of the multi-modular converter in detailed. Many controllers use PI/PID based techniques with fixed control parameters. However, this is not found to be suitable from a stability point-of-view. Issues of control stability using this controller type under one of the operating modes has led to the development of an alternative adaptive and nonlinear Lyapunov based control for the modular power converter. Finally, a detailed simulation and experimental validation of the proposed power converter operation, power sharing strategy, proposed control structures and control stability issue have been undertaken using a grid connected laboratory based multi-modular hybrid battery energy storage system prototype. The experimental validation has demonstrated the feasibility of this new energy storage system operation for use in future grid applications.