Abstract
Renewable energy-based hydrogen production via low temperature water electrolysis is attracting increased interest globally. Proton exchange membrane water electrolysis (PEMWE) offer several benefits over the more mature alkaline water electrolysis technology. The PEMWE-technology is particularly suitable for balancing variable power due to its great load-following capability. The PEMWE-technology can also be designed to operate at high current densities and pressures, which can reduce the system footprint and make the technology particularly suitable for distributed hydrogen production using solar PV energy. However, to reach the cost targets for green hydrogen more R&D on PEMWE stacks and systems is required to improve the overall system efficiency, durability, and capital costs.Institute for Energy Technology (IFE) has designed and built a flexible PEM water electrolyzer system platform for testing of small-scale prototype electrolyzers up to 33 kW and 200 bar differential pressure. This PEMWE system laboratory is part of a national research infrastructure on hydrogen and fuel cells in Norway (NFCH Centre) at the IFE Hynor Hydrogen Technology Center (IFE Hynor) at Kjeller. The PEMWE test rig is integrated with a sophisticated power conditioning system which consists of three custom-built DC/DC-converters (for PEMWE, PEMFC, and Li-ion battery systems), all coupled to the same DC-bus. This configuration makes it possible to use the Li-ion battery system to test different hybrid electric topologies for the water electrolyzer system and to emulate different loads (e.g., grid load profiles, solar PV input). IFE has also installed a 16 kWp PV-system on the roof of the IFE Hynor research building, which can be connected to the DC-bus on a need basis.The one-of-a-kind high-pressure PEMWE test facility at IFE is very well suited to study the performances of next-generation PEMWE stacks and systems, and to tailor and test control strategies that safeguard the system and maximizes efficiency and durability when operated using variable power based on renewable energy. The standard delivery pressure of PEMWE systems is today around 30 bar, but to realize H2-generation systems at several hundred bars there are several challenges related to system operability and safety that need to be addressed and solved. The first design of the high-pressure PEMWE test facility at IFE was first presented at a conference two years ago (EFCF 2019). The system has now been completed and commissioned with a state-of-art prototype high-pressure (350 bar) PEMWE stack with a production capacity of 2 Nm3/h. Details of the final design and operational procedures will be presented together with results and data from the first high-pressure PEMWE-stack test campaigns. Figure 1
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