Multi-domain and multi-scale model of a fuel cell electric vehicle to predict the effect of the operating conditions and component sizing on fuel cell degradation

Rašić, Davor (author), Katrašnik, Tomaž (author)

One of the key challenges in the design of fuel cell vehicles arises from the need for the simultaneous optimisation of their efficiency and lifetime, which is, in particular, challenging when operating under transient operating conditions; further, the minimisation of costs and the use of critical materials should be considered. To enable a more detailed virtual exploration of the design space, this paper presents a high-fidelity multi-domain and multi-scale model of a fuel cell electric vehicle that is capable of modelling the coupled phenomena from the vehicle level to intra-fuel cell level with a mechanistically based fuel cell model. The high-fidelity multi-domain and multi-scale model of a fuel cell electric vehicle is based on consistent coupling of different domains, that is, mechanical, electrical, electrochemical, gas flow, thermal, and control, which are modelled with mechanistic governing equations coupled to empirical degradation models of electrochemical devices and solved with multirate solvers ensuring flux conservations and synchronization of time steps. Establishing a consistent model based causal interactions between different domains and the significantly different scales associated with the phenomena in these domains, which more consistently virtually replicates the phenomena in a real fuel cell electric vehicle, is crucial for evaluating the impact of the parameters from high scales on intra-fuel cell spatio-temporal characteristics impacting fuel cell degradation. The results demonstrate that the application of an experimentally validated multi-domain and multi-scale model of a fuel cell electric vehicle enables the virtual exploration of interactions considering the scale of vehicle characteristics and its driving pattern to the scale of intra-fuel cell spatio-temporal characteristics and its degradation early in the development stages of the fuel cell electric vehicle. Therefore, the proposed approach represents a valuable contribution to the virtualisation of the system-level design of powertrains of fuel cell electric vehicles and supports front loading in the development process.

• Language: English
• Keywords: fuel cell electric vehicles, multi-domain multi-scale system-level modelling, lifetime, energy efficiency, multi-objective genetic algorithm optimisation
• Work type: Article
• Typology: 1.01 - Original Scientific Article
• Organization: FS - Faculty of Mechanical Engineering
• Publication status: Published
• Publication version: Version of Record
• Year: 2022
• Number of pages: 27 str.
• Numbering: Vol. 268, art. 116024
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-138725
• UDC: 621.43+621.352.6:662
• ISSN on article: 0196-8904
• DOI: 10.1016/j.enconman.2022.116024
• COBISS.SI-ID: 117952259
• Publication date in RUL: 10.08.2022

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: Energy conversion and management
• Shortened title: Energy convers. manage.
• Publisher: Elsevier
• ISSN: 0196-8904
• COBISS.SI-ID: 2618919

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: gorivne celice, električna vozila, življenjska doba, energetska učinkovitost, optimizacija, modeliranje

Projects

• Funder: ARRS - Slovenian Research Agency
• Project number: P2-0401
• Name: Energetsko strojništvo