TY - JOUR

T1 - Fuel cell power control based on a master-slave structure

T2 - A proton exchange membrane fuel cell case study

AU - Ji, Guangji

AU - Hanke-Rauschenbach, Richard

AU - Bornhöft, Astrid

AU - Zhou, Su

AU - Sundmacher, Kai

N1 - Copyright: Copyright 2017 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.

PY - 2012/6/14

Y1 - 2012/6/14

N2 - Fuel cells generally become promising candidates for the electrical power supply in automotive and stationary applications. The power control of the fuel cell is one of the essential problems. In this paper, a power control concept with a master-slave structure for fuel cell systems is suggested. Within that concept, a DC/DC converter, several slave controllers, and a master controller are combined to achieve the control objectives. The DC/ DC converter conditions the power and transfers it from the fuel cell to the load. The task of the slave controller is to maintain the controlled variables at their set points. The master controller has to select the set points for the slave controllers and limits the fuel cell output power, if the requested power exceeds the maximum power, which can be instantaneously produced by the controlled fuel cell system. The proposed control concept is demonstrated by simulations of a proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cell system taken from the literature. For that purpose, different controllers are designed based on modelfree methods. For the master controller design, two alternative options are discussed: high efficiency tracking and fast power tracking. As shown in the simulation results, high efficiency tracking leads to higher system efficiency, however, an additional energy buffer is required. In contrast, no energy buffer is needed for the option of fast power tracking. However, the system efficiency is lower. The presented control concept is meaningful for systems with dynamic load requirements and can be easily applied to different fuel cell systems due to the model-free design approach.

AB - Fuel cells generally become promising candidates for the electrical power supply in automotive and stationary applications. The power control of the fuel cell is one of the essential problems. In this paper, a power control concept with a master-slave structure for fuel cell systems is suggested. Within that concept, a DC/DC converter, several slave controllers, and a master controller are combined to achieve the control objectives. The DC/ DC converter conditions the power and transfers it from the fuel cell to the load. The task of the slave controller is to maintain the controlled variables at their set points. The master controller has to select the set points for the slave controllers and limits the fuel cell output power, if the requested power exceeds the maximum power, which can be instantaneously produced by the controlled fuel cell system. The proposed control concept is demonstrated by simulations of a proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cell system taken from the literature. For that purpose, different controllers are designed based on modelfree methods. For the master controller design, two alternative options are discussed: high efficiency tracking and fast power tracking. As shown in the simulation results, high efficiency tracking leads to higher system efficiency, however, an additional energy buffer is required. In contrast, no energy buffer is needed for the option of fast power tracking. However, the system efficiency is lower. The presented control concept is meaningful for systems with dynamic load requirements and can be easily applied to different fuel cell systems due to the model-free design approach.

KW - Master-slave structure

KW - Model-free

KW - PEM fuel cell

KW - Power control

KW - electrolysis

KW - Regenerative Fuel Cells

KW - Alkaline Water

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85016140858&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1115/1.4006801

DO - 10.1115/1.4006801

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:85016140858

VL - 13

JO - Journal of Electrochemical Energy Conversion and Storage

JF - Journal of Electrochemical Energy Conversion and Storage

SN - 2381-6872

IS - 1

M1 - 041001

ER -