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Saft batteries provide high-tech traction battery for Sitras HES hybrid energy storage system on Siemens Mobility’s trams

12th May 2010

Saft Group

ES Admin

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Saft has supplied Ni-MH (nickel-metal hydride) integrated traction battery systems to Siemens Mobility for use in the development of a new generation of trams equipped with the Sitras HES hybrid energy storage system. The first tram with Sitras HES, equipped a Saft battery system onboard, has completed more than one year of successful passenger service trials in Portugal with the Siemens Mobility customer MTS (Metro Transportes do Sul, S.A.), Since the end of 2008, it has been operating services between Almada and Seixal, two cities to the south of Lisbon.

The trams with Sitras HES can operate autonomously, without external power from an overhead contact line (OCL), over long sections of track. The concept is ideally suited for areas where impact on the local landscape must be minimized, such as in historic city centres, and is especially environmentally-friendly as well as saving energy. The Sitras HES concept comprises two energy-storing components: the Sitras MES mobile energy storage unit based on a double-layer capacitor (DLC) and the traction battery system. The two components work together to provide a very efficient energy storage system. “Saft’s Ni-MH traction batteries for the Sitras HES system was primarily chosen by Siemens Mobility because they were commercially available and could be integrated in the test programme quickly, without a long development period. Furthermore, they met Siemens stringent specifications in terms of weight, size, reliability and high energy performance”.