A study, analysis and power management schemes for fuel cells. (March 2015)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Pachauri, Rupendra Kumar; Chauhan, Yogesh K.
• Is Part Of: Renewable & sustainable energy reviews. Volume 43(2015:Mar.)
• Page Start: 1301
• Page End: 1319
• Publication Date: 2015-03
• Subjects: Green power generation -- Fuel cell technology -- Renewable energy -- Proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) -- Alkaline fuel cell (AFC) -- Solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) -- Molten carbonate fuel cell (MCFC); Renewable energy sources -- Periodicals; Power resources -- Periodicals; Énergies renouvelables -- Périodiques; Ressources énergétiques -- Périodiques; 333.794
• DOI: 10.1016/j.rser.2014.11.098
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1364-0321

Abstract

Abstract: This paper presents a novel comparative study on fuel cells (FCs) technologies, its modeling and effect of important parameters on the performance of various types of fuel cells and power management schemes. Firstly, this paper presents a comprehensive review of various FCs technologies with their working principle, efficiency, operating parameters, advantages/disadvantages and applications. Secondly, the mathematical analysis of various FCs has been investigated, which is required for MATLAB simulation of FCs. The influences of various operating parameters such as temperature, reactant flow pressure and membrane resistance are considered to investigate the dynamic behavior of FCs. Thirdly, various control schemes of power management e.g., current, voltage, power and reactants flow pressure based control schemes are proposed with simple and easy to implement PI controller for a phosphoric acid fuel cell (PAFC) operation in this paper. These control mechanisms can be utilized for power management schemes. The proposed model of PAFC along with these control schemes is realized in the MATLAB/Simulink environment. The performance of a PAFC system along with these proposed control is found to be satisfactory even under dynamic conditions. The study can be broadly helpful to select and set the various parameters for the development of a FC based application.