A DC energy storage module has a plurality of DC energy storage devices electrically connected in series; an internal control unit in the DC energy storage module; and a power supply for the internal control unit. The power supply for the internal control unit includes one or more of the DC energy storage devices in the module, electrically connected to the internal control unit through a rectifying unit.

An electrical combination. The combination comprises a hand held power tool, a battery pack and a controller. The battery pack includes a battery pack housing connectable to and supportable by the hand held power tool, a plurality of battery cells supported by the battery pack housing, each of the plurality of battery cells having a lithium-based chemistry, being individually tapped and having an individual state of charge. A communication path is provided by a battery pack sense terminal and a power tool sense terminal. The controller is operable to monitor a state of charge of a number of battery cells less than the plurality of battery cells and to generate a signal based on the monitored state of charge of the number of battery cells less than the plurality of battery cells, the signal being operable to control the operation of the hand held power tool.

A power distribution and control module includes a digital data processor and associated memory module operating an energy management program or schema and a battery charging manager program thereon. The energy management schema is operable to determine an instantaneous configuration of the power and distribution and control module, to determine total instantaneous input power available, total instantaneous power demand by connected power loads and to allocate a portion of the input power to power the loads. Thereafter any unallocated power is allocated to charge rechargeable batteries using allocation criteria that are situationally variable.

A power storage system and an equalizing charge method capable of performing equalizing charging more efficiently are provided. In the power storage system, a plurality of assembled storage batteries connected to an external power supply system including rotary machine power generation and solar power generation are charged with surplus power in daytime generated by the rotary machine power generation and the solar power generation to store the surplus power and are discharged according to insufficient power generation by the rotary machine power generation to handle the insufficient power generation. An equalizing charging operation is performed on one or two or more assembled storage batteries selected from the plurality of assembled storage batteries at time of charging with the surplus power when it is determined that equalizing charging is required.

A power supply system can include an electrical battery for supplying electrical load using pulse discharge; and a control unit to control the electrical battery to pulse discharge by periodically switching between a discharge state of the electrical battery, when the electrical battery is connected to the electrical load, and a rest state of the electrical battery when the electrical battery is disconnected from the electrical load. During the pulse discharge, the control unit can control a power source for supplying an injection current to the electrical battery during a rest period when the electrical battery is in the rest state. The control unit can further determine the voltage of the electrical battery during the rest state, and when the voltage does not meet a threshold value increase the duration of the rest period, until said threshold value is reached. Other systems, methods and apparatuses are described.

A charging method for a battery set with a plurality of battery cells, having steps of performing a serial charging on the battery cells; determining whether one of the battery cells reaches a saturation voltage; and performing a uniform separately charging on the battery cells when one of the battery cells reaches the saturation voltage, wherein the uniform separately charging comprises sorting the battery cells according to cell voltages of the battery cells; and sequentially and separately charging the sorted battery cells to a N.sup.th segmented voltage in a N.sup.th segmentation, wherein N is a positive integer from 1 to K, and K is a positive integer larger than 1. The charging method of the present disclosure can reduce the temperature rising of the battery cell due to the longtime charging.

A battery management system is described that includes a controller configured to control electrical charging and discharging of a plurality of blocks of a battery. The battery management system also includes an inter-block communication network including a master node and a plurality of slave nodes arranged in a ring-type daisy-chain configuration with the master node. The master node is coupled to the controller and configured to initiate all command messages sent through the inter-block communication network and terminate all reply messages sent through the inter-block communication network. The plurality of slave nodes is bounded by an initial node coupled to the master node and a last node coupled to the master node.

A battery management system may include: a charge control switch disposed in a high current path between a plurality of pack terminals and a battery module; and a controller configured to detect a cell voltage of each of a plurality of cells included in the battery module and a charging current flowing through a high current path, to determine an overvoltage state of the battery module based on presence or absence of the charging current and the cell voltage of each of the cells, and to turn off the charge control switch when the battery module is determined to be in an overvoltage state.

The embodiments of the present disclosure disclose a battery management system. The battery management system comprises: a battery management unit, configured to receive status information of a battery module and status information of a battery pack, and transmit a control instruction to cell measurement circuits; the cell measurement circuits, configured to collect the status information of the battery module, transmit the status information of the battery module to the battery management unit, receive and execute the control instruction transmitted from the battery management unit; sensing units, configured to collect the status information of the battery pack, and transmit the status information of the battery pack to the battery management unit; wherein a wireless communication unit is disposed in the battery management unit, and a wireless communication unit is disposed in at least a portion of the cell measurement circuits and/or at least a portion of the sensing units.

There is provided a power storage device, a power storage control device, and a power storage control method for rapidly equalizing voltages of cells with a simple configuration. A power storage device including a plurality of cells which are connected in series; a plurality of reactance elements which are connected in series; a plurality of connection lines configured to connect the respective cells and the respective reactance elements in parallel in a one-to-one correspondence; a plurality of switching elements configured to independently open and close each of the connection lines; and a power storage control device configured to control the switching elements to cause energy to be transferred between the cells.