Development of supercapacitors with high surface area porous self-assembled electrodes for marine renewable energy extraction

Project Description

The project aims to develop novel supercapacitors with enhanced power that could be suitable for addressing current limitations of supercapacitors used in marine renewable energy, smoothing of power fluctuations arising from current swells. in this sense the project is aligned with the National research priority area J "Marine Renewable Energy". The project is of multidisciplinary nature and it aims at addressing one of the main challenges in renewable marine energy power harnessing for practical applications: the smoothing of tidal and swells power fluctuations. Current approaches require the use of combined supercapacitor/battery storage systems. The project team is proposing a novel supercapacitor which will substantially increase (up to 20%) the lifetime of the hybrid energy storage system, due to reduced loading effects on the battery component. The successful implementation of these novel supercapacitors to marine turbines has the potential for realisation of the best in class supercapacitor for power smoothing in tidal turbines.