Batteries and battery systems for storing electrical energy
AssigneeTanktwo Oy
InventorsBert Holtappels, Juha Tuomola, Timo Rissanen
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A battery unit comprising an electric energy reservoir having positive and negative voltage supply terminals, three or more electric contact pads on an outer surface of the battery unit, and a dynamically configurable connection unit for electrically connecting each of said positive and negative voltage supply terminals to any one or more of said electric contact pads, wherein electric energy can be drawn from the electric energy reservoir via selectively different combinations of electric contact pads.
Claims19
A rollable battery unit comprising:
- an electric energy reservoir having positive and negative voltage supply terminals;
- three or more electric contact pads on an outer surface of the battery unit;
- a dynamically configurable connection unit comprising a controller and a plurality of switches for electrically coupling each of said positive and negative voltage supply terminals to any one or more of said electric contact pads, wherein electric energy can be drawn from the electric energy reservoir via selectively different combinations of electric contact pads;
- and
- an internal communication unit adapted to operate using a predefined communication protocol either through the electric contact pads or wirelessly, in order to communicate with at least one of other battery units and a central control unit of an electric tank and host apparatus of the battery unit to receive programming commands for selectively connecting the positive and negative voltage supply terminals to the electric contact pads,
- the internal communication unit being connected to the dynamically configurable connection unit in order to effect the programming commands.
A method of supplying electrical energy to a load, the method comprising:
- loading a plurality of battery units, each of which comprise three or more electric contact pads on an outer surface of the batter units, into a battery tank such that electrical contact pads of adjacent battery units are in contact and the orientation and location of individual battery units within the tank is unknown a priori;
- identifying one or more optimal electrical energy supply paths through the loaded battery units via contacting electrical contact pads;
- programming the battery units using a dynamically configurable connection unit comprising a controller and a plurality of switches to cause positive and negative battery unit voltages to be selectively supplied to appropriate battery unit contact pads, thereby establishing said optimal energy supply path(s);
- and
- drawing power from the established energy supply path(s) to supply said load.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.