SITRAM is an Industrial Research and Experimental Development project, born in order to meet the requirements of the call for tender on "Sustainable Mobility" founded by Italian Ministry of Economic Development under the Industry Programme 2015. Ansaldo STS s.p.a. is the leading company of SITRAM.
Target
The “Sustainable Mobility” is the main target of the SITRAM programme, because it is considered, by the companies, the decisive competitive factor in order to keep and to get new market shares. The main performances, “targets”, that SITRAM wants to improve are:
- Safety and Security;
- Energy Efficiency;
- Environment friendly;
- Reliability;
- Availability.
Activities at TRLab
The objective of the activity is the realization of an on-board storage system for energy recovery during the braking operations of light railway vehicles. The installation of a supercapacitor stack based on SC technology is carried out on the vehicle SIRIO along the tram-way of Naples.
Main contribution:
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Implementation of real-time controls for on-board energy management for maximum energy recovery.
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Stand-alone configuration and integrated solution for a power converter with the traction inverter.
- Supercapacitor modelling for traction application.
- Electromechanical Simulator of Tram-way Line.
Experimental tests are conducted on an electromechanical simulator realized in TRLab.
Future Direction
These studies are continuing in order to verify the possibility of replacing the traditional traction inverter with a modular multilevel converter (MMC) integrated with energy storage devices. The main problems focus on the control of MMC during start-up, when the DC-voltage fluctuations are quite large.
Main Industrial Partners
Ansaldo STS & Breda, Elsag Datamt, Dimac Red
Main Institutions
DIETI-UniNA, DiM-PoiMi,DiS-UniGe, DiE-UniFi, TEST
Presentation
Background
Recent studies estimate a contribute of the railway traffic in Europe within 2015 of the 10% for the passengers and of the 15% for the vehicles, in comparison with the total of persons and means mobility. This trend is also manifest on the Italian national territory, where the railway traffic users increase is uninterrupted and is becoming more and more competitive with respect to airbus (for medium distances) and automotive (for short distances). On the other hand, the regional and national energetic political strategies impose a continuous effort in the eco-sustainability and energy saving direction both for the vehicles and for the infrastructure management.
Objective
In this scenario, the project SFERE has the aim to develop technologies and innovative management and control strategies which will be directed to improve the energy efficiency of the rail transport vectors on the urban and regional scale and of the power supply systems of the railway substations. The transport vectors based on traditional power supply components have already a very good energy efficiency; on the other hand, further margins (eventually remarkable) to improve efficiency can still be found utilizing innovative components and developing control and management strategies at the “system” level. As regards the transport vector study, the project activities will be focused on the development of an innovative propulsion system consisting of the following elements:
•permanent magnets motors with high electric and mechanical efficiency and with high power density;
•optimized components and modulation techniques for power converters supplying permanent magnets motors;
•electronic transformer at medium frequency optimized for rail traction systems;
•on board super-capacitors to be integrated with the power line for the management of energy fluxes;
•high performances control system, based on modern hardware platforms and software algorithms for the implementation of advanced controllers;
•simplified and lighter innovative bogie able to lodge the motor group.
At the system level, as regards the substation and its interaction with the transport vector, in the project will be studied and developed the following topics:
•control systems algorithms and methodologies aimed at the optimization of energy fluxes, both on board and on the infrastructure;
•electric energy storage system with super-capacitors for urban and metropolitan transport;
•methodology oriented towards the system energy analysis for a better management of the vehicle and of the fleet.
The research results will be also verified experimentally by developing several demonstrators: the “real-time hardware in the loop” system for the control platforms and algorithms, the permanent magnets motor with its power converter for the local transportation vector, the on board and on substation super-capacitors, the medium frequency electronic transformer.
Partners
AnsaldoBreda&STS, TRS, DIETI-UniNa, DiMe UniSa, UniBen, Metrocampania, Atenix.