Реферат: Fuel Cells Flywhheels And Hybrids Essay Research

Another departure from chemical-based battery technology is the flywheel. All flywheels,

including those presently on vehicle engines, act as sort of mechanical batteries, storing

energy by spinning. Friction, of course, is their enemy. In new flywheel technology plans

are to create a nearly frictionless environment?essentially a vacuum?around the

flywheel by enclosing it in a shell and mounting it on liquid or magnetic bearings.

To create electricity, magnets mounted on the flywheel would pass close by tightly

wound wires lining the shell?s interior. Drawbacks are that charging such a system

requires some initial force to get the flywheel up to operating speed (which can be as

high as 100,000 rpm) and that lightweight but strong composites instead of common

metals must be used to construct the flywheel to prevent it from breaking apart.

3.Hybrids

Hybrid vehicles typically feature two different power sources?working either in parallel

or in series?to propel the vehicle. Much research is under way combining gasoline or

diesel-fueled internal combustion engines with electrically powered motors to get the job

done.

In a parallel setup, both power sources drive the wheels. For example, an electric motor

may accelerate the car to highway speeds, whereupon a small internal combustion

engine, or ICE, then takes over to power the wheels for cruising. With this system, the

ICE need only be large enough to maintain speed, and the energy supply for the electric

motor need not provide long range.

In a series setup, power from both engine sources is sent to a single additional motor or

controller that drives the wheels. In such a vehicle, an electric motor might run on

batteries that in turn could be charged by a generator operated by a small internal

combustion engine. Such a combination could extend the range of an EV considerably.

Already there has been an example of a hybrid vehicle, albeit extreme: the Chrysler

Patriot race car project of the early ?90s. The Patriot used liquefied natural gas to fuel an

internal combustion engine that, in turn, spun two turbines providing electricity. A

flywheel generated additional power.

All the electricity was controlled by a computer that both delegated which power source