Freeze start of proton exchange membrane fuel cell systems with closed-loop purging and improved voltage consistency

Haisong Xu, Lei Wang, Lei Xie, Hongye Su, Jianshan Lu and Zhiyang Liu

Applied Energy, 2024, vol. 374, issue C, No S0306261924010857

Abstract: In this paper, a novel freeze start strategy is proposed for the proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) systems under sub-freezing temperature, which involves the closed-loop purging during shutdown procedure and voltage consistency improving during cold start procedure. For the shutdown purging, a differential stack resistance-based method is proposed to characterize the water content of membrane electrode assembly online, which is established on standard current and voltage sensors with no need of installing extra equipment. With the derived water content, a three-stage closed-loop purging scheme is developed to effectively complete the shutdown purging in the sense of maintaining the stack humidity within a reasonable range and preventing irreversible freeze damage to the stack. For the cold start, by establishing the stack’s ice formulation model and thermal dynamic model, a protective ramp current-based strategy is proposed to succeed the cold start, while avoiding the sharp voltage overshoot and improving the voltage consistency. To verify the effectiveness and reliability, the proposed freeze start strategy is implemented in a commercial PEMFC system. The experimental results show that the shutdown purging is completed within about 200s to 260s, and the PEMFC is successfully started from -30°C within 186.5s, with improved voltage consistency.

Keywords: PEMFC; Freeze start; Shutdown purge; Voltage consistency (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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DOI: 10.1016/j.apenergy.2024.123702

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