Modeling of Proton Exchange Membrane (PEM) fuel cell & voltage regulation

• Main Author: Ye, Nay Lin.
• Other Authors: School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2013
• Subjects: DRNTU::Engineering
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/53240
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

The energy demand of global industry has been increasing every year and majority of the energy demand is supplied by burning hydrocarbon based fossil fuel. However, the shortage of fossil fuel supply and the environmental impacts, such as global warming and pollutions, are challenging us to find alternative energy sources other than fossil fuels. Over the last few decades, fuel cell technology has caught intensive attention and shown a promising potential to be a clean and renewable energy source for substituting traditional combustion generators. Along the journey of fuel cell development, scientists and researchers had successfully developed various types of fuel cells for different applications. Among all types of fuel cells, Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell (PEMFC) becomes one of the leading candidates for transportation, portable applications and stationary power generation due to its characteristics of having high efficiency, high power density, quick startup, no emission, low operating temperature and being portable in size. Despite of having these superior advantages, fuel cells are yet to be commercialized due to its limitations of being costly to build and slow to respond transient situations. In order to overcome these limitations, it is essential to have better understanding of fuel cell behaviors and characteristics. The main objective of this study is to investigate the properties and characteristics of PEM fuel cell system by developing a simple dynamic model of PEM fuel cell. In this report, Chapter 2 presents literature review on PEM fuel cell basic operation, essential components for constructing a PEM fuel cell and its applications. In Chapter 3, a dynamic PEM fuel cell model is developed based on the mathematical models of thermodynamic, gas diffusion, energy losses and electrochemical reactions. From this dynamic model, we can gain better understanding about PEM fuel cell and its behaviors. Chapter 4 of this report will discuss about the voltage control system for PEM fuel cell output voltage and how to regulate the voltage through power electronic devices, so that fluctuated DC voltage of PEMFC can be regulated effectively and can be used to supply a reliable power to the electrical loads.