Batteries in Power Supplies for the New Telecommunication Services

A General survey on battery power supply today and tomorrow within the telecommunication services of the F.R. of Germany. The growing number of new services and modern equipment will be supplied with energy using the existing AC and DC power distribution systems. The principle of permanent power supply demands stored energy either in the fuel tanks of IC (Internal Combustion) Generator sets or in batteries. The network will be extended by optical fibre cables not capable of transporting energy. Computorized equipment requires increasingly continous power supply for memory back up. The three main categories which need stored energy in batteries are: - the central services (as exchanges. repeator stations, a.s.o.) - the subscriber premises (e.g. with optical fibre cables) - the memory backup (in various equipment) For the first category the station battery - central or decentral - will be the solution also in the future. For the decentral power equipment medium and small sizes of rechargeble batteries in maintenance free desing are preferred. Only smaller sizes of rechargeble batteries in maintenancefree design are prefered for the second category. For the third category: energy supply of memory back up's, the design alternative is between primary cells (Lithium) and secondary cells (NiCd button cells). For all types of batteries there is a high demand on reliability during service life and on maintenancefree operation. This requires changes in design of the existing battery types and or newly developed batteries.