Real-time capable transient model of liquid water dynamics in proton exchange membrane fuel cells

Kravos, Andraž (author), Kregar, Ambrož (author), Penga, Željko (author), Barbir, Frano (author), Katrašnik, Tomaž (author)

Optimal control of liquid water dynamics plays an instrumental role in achieving optimised performance and prolonged lifetime of PEM Fuel Cells (PEMFC). Tackling these challenges calls for precise on-line monitoring and control tools such as coupled virtual observers taking into consideration also liquid water dynamics. The latter proves to be especially challenging to model due to varying retention and removal rates of liquid and gaseous water depending on the operating conditions thus representing a longstanding knowledge gap. To fill this gap, this contribution presents derivation of a 1D+1D system level physically motivated two-phase model of PEMFC, which enables consistent treatment of liquid water dynamics on the system level in all seven most influential regions of the PEMFC, namely membrane, anode and cathode channels, GDLs, and catalyst layers, while exhibiting real-time readiness with real-time factor of 0.0449. The model is extensively tested on single-cell data, which consists of five sets of experiments with different operating regimes and durations. Overall results exhibit good agreement with experimental data in all of the performed tests with R$^2$ factors larger than 0.95. Newly developed features of the model enable its use in development of advanced control methodologies and hardware-in-the-loop as well as digital twin applications.

• Language: English
• Keywords: low temperature PEM fuel cells, performance modelling, liquid water dynamics, physically motivated model, transient operation validation, virtual observers
• Work type: Article
• Typology: 1.01 - Original Scientific Article
• Organization: FS - Faculty of Mechanical Engineering; PEF - Faculty of Education
• Publication status: Published
• Publication version: Version of Record
• Year: 2022
• Number of pages: 16 str.
• Numbering: Vol. 541, art. 231598
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-137253
• UDC: 532:621.352.6
• ISSN on article: 0378-7753
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jpowsour.2022.231598
• COBISS.SI-ID: 110908675
• Publication date in RUL: 08.06.2022

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: Journal of power sources
• Shortened title: J. power sources
• Publisher: Elsevier
• ISSN: 0378-7753
• COBISS.SI-ID: 25782784

Licences

• License: CC BY-NC-ND 4.0, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
• Link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
• Description: The most restrictive Creative Commons license. This only allows people to download and share the work for no commercial gain and for no other purposes.

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Keywords: nizkotemperaturne PEM gorivne celice, modeliranje zmogljivosti, dinamika tekoče vode, fizikalno osnovani model, validiranje delovanja s prehodnimi pojavi, virtualna tipala