Research Summaries

Back Root Cause Analysis of Premature Capacity Loss in Valve-Regulated Lead Acid (VRLA) Batteries

Fiscal Year 2011
Division Graduate School of Engineering & Applied Science
Department Physics
Investigator(s) Osswald, Sebastian
Sponsor Naval Surface Warfare Center-Crane Division (Navy)
Summary The aim of this project is to support the U.S. Navy in determining the cause of the premature capacity loss that is observed in a large number of VRLA batteries after 12-18 months in operation. While earlier half-cell studies conducted by Dr. Bayles and his team suggest that the capacity fade originates from the positive plate and is related to an increase in resistance, both nature and mechanism of the resistance increase remain unknown. In order to determine the cause of the observed capacity loss we propose three separate tasks to be executed in parallel at NPS: (1) Electrode and Electrolyte Characterization, (2) Analytical Laboratory-Scale Half-and Full-Cell Testing, and (3) Electrochemical Cell Modeling. The experiments will be conducted by one or two of our officer students in the scope of their thesis research. The student(s) will be selected and supervised by Prof. Osswald. The project starts with the availability of the required resources. Anticipated project length is 12 months.
Keywords
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Data Publications, theses (not shown) and data repositories will be added to the portal record when information is available in FAIRS and brought back to the portal