Improving the Fuel Economy and Battery Lifespan in Fuel Cell/Renewable Hybrid Power Systems Using the Power-Following Control of the Fueling Regulators

Abstract

In this study, the performance and safe operation of the fuel cell (FC) system and battery-based energy storage system (ESS) included in an FC/ESS/renewable hybrid power system (HPS) is fully analyzed under dynamic load and variable power from renewable sources. Power-following control (PFC) is used for either the air regulator or the fuel regulator of the FC system, or it is switched to the inputs of the air and hydrogen regulators based on a threshold of load demand; these strategies are referred to as air-PFC, fuel-PFC, and air/fuel-PFC, respectively. The performance and safe operation of the FC system and battery-based ESS under these strategies is compared to the static feed-forward (sFF) control used by most commercial strategies implemented in FC systems, FC/renewable HPSs, and FC vehicles. This study highlights the benefits of using a PFC-based strategy to establish FC-system fueling flows, in addition to an optimal control of the boost power converter to maximize fuel economy. For example, the fuel economy for a 6 kW FC system using the air/fuel-PFC strategy compared to the strategies air-PFC, fuel-PFC, and the sFF benchmark is 6.60%, 7.53%, and 12.60% of the total hydrogen consumed by these strategies under a load profile of up and down the stairs using 1 kW/2 s per step. For an FC/ESS/renewable system, the fuel economy of an air/fuel-PFC strategy compared to same strategies is 7.28%, 8.23%, and 13.43%, which is better by about 0.7% because an FC system operates at lower power due to the renewable energy available in this case study.

Keywords

• fuel cell
• hydrogen economy
• fuel starvation
• safe operation
• electrical energy efficiency