Testing of a sodium nickel chloride (ZEBRA) battery for electric propulsion of ships and vehicles

One of the promising future batteries for electric propulsion of vehicles a nd ships is the sodium/nickel chloride or ZEBRA (Zero Emission Battery Rese arch Activities) battery. Despite some disadvantages with respect to the hi gh temperature, the advantages with respect to specific energy and energy d ensity are such that, especially in applications where the battery is used on a more or less continuous basis (e.g., in delivery vans and taxies) it i s an interesting candidate battery. Another interesting application is on b oard of ships, like submarines or future electrical surface ships with elec tric propulsion. In 1995 a 2 year feasibility study, including experimental testing of a 10 kW h battery, was completed. This investigated the naval a pplicability of the sodium/sulphur battery, which is also a high temperatur e battery. Here the limited, experimentally pro;en, life-time of the batter ies of about 1.5 years and this made naval application almost impossible. A paper about this study was presented at the 19th International Power Sourc es Symposium held at Brighten, England, in April 1995 [R.A.A. Schillemans, C.E. Kluiters, Sodium/sulphur batteries for naval applications, in: A. Atte well, T. Keily (Eds.), Power Sources 15, International Power Sources Sympos ium Committee, Crowborough UK, 1995. p. 421.]. Because of the more or less comparable specifications on specific energy and the more promising results of the life-time and field tests with sodium/nickel chloride batteries, a ZEBRA battery from AEG Angle Batteries has been tested for naval applicatio ns. This was done by simulating the charge and discharge as it occurs in pr actice for the applications investigated. With respect to the electrical sh ip application (investigated for the Royal Netherlands Navy) the power vers us time taken from the battery was simulated as well as the charge procedur es. The same can be done for the vehicle application: in this case typical drive cycles for a van or taxi are translated to power versus time taken fr om the battery. The results of the tests for application of the battery in naval ships are very promising. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science S.A. All rights r eserved.