Fuel cell humidity modeling and control using cathode internal water content

Abstract

Humidity of proton exchange membrane fuel cell, a critical underlying variable that affects stack efficiency and durability, is quite challenging to be well controlled due to the measuring difficulty and multiple couplings with other variables. For precise humidity description and control, this paper utilizes the internal water content as the feedback signal, whose dynamic model is developed by taking into account various auxiliary couplings. Based on the mechanistic model, the dynamic responses of the internal water content are exhibited and analyzed by manipulating the external current, air compressor voltage and humidifier electrical power, respectively. It is shown that the internal water content is able to better describe the real humidity environment, in contrast with the conventional method using cathode inlet relative humidity. Furthermore, a combined feed-forward and feedback control structure is proposed to maintain the internal humidity as close to the desired as possible. Simulation results show that the proposed control method is able to maintain the fuel cell operating within the safe and efficient region, and the humidification power consumption can be reduced because of the precise and less conservative description on the internal humidity.