Fuel Cells in Telecom as a Backup System

During natural disasters, the lack of adequate backup power for communications facilities is a critical problem that cause network interruptions and hamper recovery efforts. Many existing sites have a valve-regulated lead-acid battery bank that provides up to four hours of backup power capacity in the event of a power outage. Some larger and/or more centrally located sites have diesel generators for backup power purposes. However, four hours of backup can be regarded as a limiting factor – longer runtime is regularly required in fast-growth telecom networks where the electricity grid is unreliable or where natural disasters are a real threat. Deployment of fuel cell systems is a practical option for telecom providers needing robust, reliable, extended-duration backup power supply at cellular telecommunication sites during emergencies. In this paper a comparison between fuel cell and lead-acid battery as a backup system for telecom has been accomplished. The results shown that fuel cell is much efficient.

کلیدواژه ها:

fuel cell ، telecom ، lead-acid battery ، backup system