Development of an integrated fuel cell system simulator for multi-purpose applications

Authors

S. Hasegawa, M. Kageyama, M. Kawase - Department of Chemical Engineering, Kyoto, Y. Ikogi - Toyota Motor Corporation , S. Kim - Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology

Summary

A 1-dimentional (1D) model to simulate the dynamic behavior of an integrated fuel cell (FC) system is investigated. The model consists of the physical models of the FC stack and the hydrogen (H2), air, and coolant systems. To ensure numerical simulation of the entire FC system in life-long system operation (> 10 years) in acceptable calculation time, a proper model resolution is selected. The subsystem models are integrated with the FC stack model and controllers developed in the authors’ previous research to build a closed-loop simulator of an integrated FC system. The dynamic system behavior of the FC system and the overall system performance, such as fuel economy and thermal balance, are simulated. It is demonstrated that the complicated relationships between the specifications of the fuel cell materials, system components, and the overall system performance could be quantified. It is expected that considerable efforts on development of various FC system products by the topological investigations with the costly prototypes can be replaced with the numerical simulation.