Oxygen starvation control of proton exchange membrane fuel cell through fusion control strategy

Abstract

Oxygen excess ratio (OER) is regarded as a significant indicator of the safety and efficient operation of the open-cathode proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) system. This is because inappropriate OER is prone to the phenomenon of oxygen starvation and oxygen saturation under load conditions change frequently. To avoid the phenomenon, this paper integrates linear active disturbance rejection control (LADRC) and proportional integral differential (PID) control to regulate OER of fuel cell air supply system, which effectively combines model-based and data-driven LADRC structure. As the controller parameters directly affect the control performance and it is difficult to obtain the optimal control parameters. Especially, when the load conditions change, the control parameters are difficult to adapt the load changes. To this end, a snake optimization (SO) algorithm with easy implementation and fast convergence is used to realtime update the controller parameters, which can further improve the control effects. Firstly, an equivalent linear model of fuel cell air supply system is established. Secondly, a hybrid LADRC method is developed by combining the merits of the LADRC and PID methods. Thirdly, the SO algorithm is used to optimize the controller parameters, which can achieve the optimal control parameters. Finally, the results revealed that the proposed method has a faster response with less noise sensitivity against the load changes and stronger robustness than the other methods.