US 9,551,219 B2 · Valves

Abstract

An apparatus (10) for compressing and expanding a gas includes a chamber (22), a positive displacement device (24) moveable relative thereto, first and second valves (26, 28) activatable to control flow of gas into and out of the chamber (22), and a controller (80) for controlling activation of the valves (26, 28) that selectively switches operation between a compression and an expansion mode with selective switching between modes being achieved by selectively changing the activation timing of at least one of the valves during the first mode. An energy storage system including the device may be operatively coupled via a rotary device for power transmission to an input/output device, whereby the direction and speed of rotation are preserved during switching, and the input/output device may be synchronized to the grid.

Claims8

Dependent claims

A method of gas compression and expansion, the method comprising:

receiving a gas in a chamber for which first and second valves are operable to control gas flow into and out of the chamber;
and
selectively changing, with a controller, an activation timing of at least one of the first and second valves to selectively switch operation of a positive displacement device moveable relative to the chamber between a compression mode in which the gas received in the chamber is compressed by the positive displacement device and an expansion mode in which the gas received in the chamber is expanded by the positive displacement device, wherein the activation timing is changed during the operation of the positive displacement device in one of the compression and expansion modes.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Valves

Life of this patent

Valves

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims8