Abstract
This paper details a study carried out by UCL to explore potential improvements to the Fuel Cell (FC) bus propulsion system specifically designed for the city driving environment. In this paper, a 1:10 scaled lab based FC bus drive train has been developed to study the performance of a FC directly driving an AC induction motor. The PEMFC is the main power source for the drive train while a boost converter will work as the power conditioning system to control the FC output voltage. The AC motor will work as the bus prime mover. The system has been built in the Electrical Laboratory to evaluate the performance of a FC driving a motor. MATLAB Simulink has been used to simulate the system and has been validated against the lab based system. A number of tests have been carried out in terms of efficiency and transit change response with both the lab and simulated models. The results showed that the FC is capable of directly powering the motor in general bus driving conditions, but it is not well suited for quick transient changes. This study provides an important contribution to further improve the FC bus with hybrid propulsion systems and validates the computer model to allow faster analysis of proposed system improvements. The next step of this study is to use an energy storage system to aid the FC to cover quick transient power demand and validate it against a representative load system.
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