Critical Review of Flywheel Energy Storage System

Abstract

This review presents a detailed summary of the latest technologies used in flywheel energy storage systems (FESS). This paper covers the types of technologies and systems employed within FESS, the range of materials used in the production of FESS, and the reasons for the use of these materials. Furthermore, this paper provides an overview of the types of uses of FESS, covering vehicles and the transport industry, grid leveling and power storage for domestic and industrial electricity providers, their use in motorsport, and applications for space, satellites, and spacecraft. Different types of machines for flywheel energy storage systems are also discussed. This serves to analyse which implementations reduce the cost of permanent magnet synchronous machines. As well as this, further investigations need to be carried out to determine the ideal temperature range of operation. Induction machines are currently stoutly designed with lower manufacturing cost, making them unsuitable for high-speed operations. Brushless direct current machines, the Homolar machines, and permanent magnet synchronous machines should also be considered for future research activities to improve their performance in a flywheel energy storage system. An active magnetic bearing can also be used alongside mechanical bearings to reduce the control systems’ complications, thereby making the entire system cost-effective.

Design of a Low-Loss, Low-Cost Rolling Element Bearing System for a 5 kWh/100 kW Flywheel Energy Storage System

“…-AMBs may be advantageous in terms of service life and offer adjustable stiffness and damping, which is beneficial in terms of achieving reliable machine dynamics behavior [48]. -Drawbacks because of low damping in REBs are compensated for by the introduction of an elastomer suspension, which provides external (viscous) damping to the bearing system.…”

Selection Guidelines for Wind Energy Technologies

“…The storage system can store excess energy and supply this back to the load when demand is high, hence helping to smooth the energy generation profile. Some of the storage systems that can be considered include a flywheel [170,171], compressed air [172,173], supercapacitors [174][175][176], fuel cells [7,177], and batteries [178,179]. Different types of energy storage systems have been used in literature for wind energy systems [180].…”

A Mobile Energy Storage Unit Serving Multiple EV Charging Stations

“…, 24}. The objective function is defined in Equation (1), which aims to minimize the total drained power by the PLs to charge the arrival EVs, as follows:…”

“…The distribution grid faces various challenges and obstacles due to the increase in the number of distributed generation (DG) units, such as wind and solar, in addition to the failure to meet growing demand for electric power, especially in urban areas. Future power grids in urban areas will focus on integrating energy storage systems (ESSs) to meet the increasing demand without compromising its CO 2 emission reduction advantage [1]. In particular, due to falls in the price of the lithium-ion batteries, the most common type of batteries used in ESS [2], it is more attractive for utilities to use such technologies in their systems.…”