SimulationofaPEMFC-supercapacitorhybridsystem.docVIP

Simulation of a PEMFC-super capacitor hybrid system S. Saillera,b, F. Druarta, D. Riub, P. Ozila a: LEPMI, UMR 5631, 1130 rue de la piscine 38402 st martin d’hères Cedex b: G2Elab, UMR 5269, BP 46, Domaine universitaire, 38402 st martin d’hères Cedex Abstract Nowadays, fuel cell systems seem to be a good alternative to fossil energies, in order to reduce greenhouse effect gas production. However, fuel cells behavior is governed by various physicochemical phenomena. Thus fuel cell implementation in electrical system is difficult, this is due to fuel cell complex electrical behavior and low voltage. Moreover, static converters working at such low voltage range present unsatisfactory efficiency. To avoid designing oversize fuel cell stack due to consumption peak, we combine fuel cell with storage device, so peaks are assumed by the super capacitor. In this work, authors have studied an hybrid system combining a PEMFC fuel cell stack and a super capacitor. In order to predict system performances, simulations were carried out using Matlab-Simulink. The system is composed of fuel cell stack, super capacitor and two DC/DC converters. On one hand, converts aim is to bring a constant system’s output voltage and, on the other hand, to request storage when fuel cell response is insufficient. In order to provide high quality electrical signal, we constrain an output voltage maximum variation less than 1V. The command loops of converters have to be determined in order to improve system control. Several control laws can be used, e.g. hysteresis control loops for current control and a PI corrector were adopted to control output voltage. To design control laws, the fuel cell stack is described as a constant voltage source in serial association with a resistance, the super capacitor is assumed as a constant voltage source. The simulated system is composed of a 500W PEMFC stack (operating voltage: 12V) and a 52F super capacitor (operating voltage: 15V). Transient behaviors are studie