Research on anode pressure control and dynamic performance of proton-exchange membrane fuel cell system for vehicular application

Abstract

Reasonable anode pressure supply can not only improve the performance output of proton-exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC), but also effectively protect the proton-exchange membrane (PEM). In this article, a practicable feedforward-based proportional-integrative (FFPI) anode pressure control strategy is designed and successfully applied to a 100 kW-class automotive PEMFC system, where the current and anode purging are considered as interferences to apply feedforward compensation. The fuel cell system test bench exhibits good dynamic performance in load change experiments, the cell voltage consistency, power generation efficiency and hydrogen utilization of the system remain at a high level. To further suppress interference and reduce overshoot, oscillation and pressure response hysteresis, a control-oriented model of this 100 kW PEMFC system is constructed, and a novel second-order fuzzy active disturbance rejection controller (SOFADRC) is designed. Simulation results indicate that compared to FFPI controller and second-order ADRC (SOADRC), the maximum absolute error (MAE), average absolute error (AAE), and root-mean-square error (RMSE) of SOFADRC all reach the minimum values respectively under the step-load and China light-duty vehicle test cycle (CLTC) operating conditions, which are 6.51 kPa, 0.09 kPa, 0.42 kPa and 8.95 kPa, 0.62 kPa, 1.35 kPa respectively, showing the outstanding control effect.