• Question: what are the advantages and disadvantages or using super capacitors?

    Asked by Michael Manning to Dona on 9 Nov 2015.
    • Photo: Dona Galhena

      Dona Galhena answered on 9 Nov 2015:


      Compared with conventional capacitors, the specific energy of supercapacitors is several orders of magnitude higher (hence the ‘super’ or ‘ultra’ prefix). And they also have a higher specific power than most batteries. In addition, due to their highly reversible charge storage process, supercapacitors have longer cycle-lives and can be both rapidly charged and discharged. They are environmentally friendly, of high safety, and can be operated in a wide temperature range.
      The main disadvantage of the supercapacitors is their low energy density (compared to batteries), and thus the application is still limited in terms of specific energy (That means the amount of energy a Supercap can store is lower than the energy a battery could store – low energy density. But you can draw that energy much faster from a supercap than from a battery – high power density).

      So, all over the world considerable research is presently being directed towards the development of supercapacitors with the overall goals of increasing energy density with minimum sacrifice in present very high levels of power density and cycle life.

Comments