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NETA About Internal Resistance Battery
NETA About Internal Resistance Battery
by Rick Lawrence
Megger
I
n the world of stationary batteries, there is a tremendous amount of pres- The study encompassed some-
sure to reduce operating and maintenance costs associated with batteries. where around 34,000 cells over a
period of about four years. One
The same is true for many other installed assets. Furthermore, there have conclusion drawn from this study
been many papers and presentations about the best method to test batteries at was “Internal ohmic measurements
the lowest possible cost while extracting the most performance and verifying [sic, impedance, dc resistance and
conductance] proved an effective
that performance. indicator of the general health of
Since the beginning of battery-testing time, there have been two important a station battery and its individual
changes in testing. One is the realization that there is no correlation between cells. These measurements reliably
voltage/specific gravity and battery capacity and the other is the introduction predicted degraded battery cells.
of internal ohmic testing methods, namely impedance, dc resistance and con- With few exceptions, cells with a
ductance. Internal ohmic testing is both efficient and extremely cost-effective. poor internal ohmic value also had
Other tools and measurements are necessary, indeed, yet are not as important a low capacity when checked by a
when determining the state-of-health of installed batteries. These other tools discharge capacity test. Further-
include dc voltage, float current and yes, discharge testing. However, it is only more, a high degree of correla-
internal ohmic testing that can reliably fill the gap between discharge tests. In tion was demonstrated between
fact, internal ohmic testing can extend the time between discharge tests from the three types of internal ohmic
an annual event to a triennial event, thus saving much time and money without measurements (conductance, im-
sacrificing backup time. pedance and resistance): all three
A review of IEEE 450 and IEEE 1188 over the ages will reveal the changing test technologies were effective.
landscape in the required testing of stationary batteries. Included in IEEE 450 The results of this project readily
is a discussion of the three major techniques of internal ohmic testing. The main demonstrate that internal ohmic
body of this paper deals with the apparent and real differences among the three measurements can be a valuable
internal ohmic techniques. part of a battery maintenance
An enormous study was commissioned by EPRI, the Electric Power Research program.”
Institute, in Palo Alto, California. The study had three objectives: Armed with this information
a prospective purchaser of an in-
• To determine the extent to which internal ohmic measurements can identify ternal ohmic instrument should
low capacity or degraded cells understand the similarities and
differences among the three major
• To evaluate the correlation between battery capacity and internal ohmic manufacturers of the instrumenta-
measurements tion as well as having full under-
• To provide guidelines to assist users with the implementation of internal ohmic standing of battery construction,
measurements in a battery maintenance program battery failure modes, and testing
parameters and methods (beyond
just internal ohmic tests).