Abstract
The successful and fast start-up of proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) at
subfreezing temperatures (cold start) is very important for the use of PEMFCs as energy sources
for automotive applications. The effective thermal management of PEMFCs is of major importance. When hydrogen is stored in hydride-forming intermetallics, significant amounts of heat are released due to the exothermic nature of the reaction. This excess of heat can potentially be used for PEMFC thermal management and to accelerate the cold start. In the current work, this possibility is extensively studied. Three hydride-forming intermetallics are introduced and their hydrogenation behavior is
evaluated. In addition, five thermal management scenarios of the metal hydride beds are studied in order to enhance the kinetics of the hydrogenation. The optimum combination of the intermetallic,
hydrogenation behavior, weight and complexity of the thermal management system was chosen forthe study of thermal coupling with the PEMFCs. A 1D GT-SUITE model was built to stimulate the
thermal coupling of a 100 kW fuel cell stack with the metal hydride. The results show that the use of the heat from the metal hydride system was able to reduce the cold start by up to 8.2%.
subfreezing temperatures (cold start) is very important for the use of PEMFCs as energy sources
for automotive applications. The effective thermal management of PEMFCs is of major importance. When hydrogen is stored in hydride-forming intermetallics, significant amounts of heat are released due to the exothermic nature of the reaction. This excess of heat can potentially be used for PEMFC thermal management and to accelerate the cold start. In the current work, this possibility is extensively studied. Three hydride-forming intermetallics are introduced and their hydrogenation behavior is
evaluated. In addition, five thermal management scenarios of the metal hydride beds are studied in order to enhance the kinetics of the hydrogenation. The optimum combination of the intermetallic,
hydrogenation behavior, weight and complexity of the thermal management system was chosen forthe study of thermal coupling with the PEMFCs. A 1D GT-SUITE model was built to stimulate the
thermal coupling of a 100 kW fuel cell stack with the metal hydride. The results show that the use of the heat from the metal hydride system was able to reduce the cold start by up to 8.2%.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 418-432 |
| Number of pages | 15 |
| Journal | Hydrogen |
| Volume | 3 |
| Issue number | 4 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 1 Nov 2022 |
Bibliographical note
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.Keywords
- hydrogen storage
- metal hydrides
- thermal management
- PEM fuel cell
- thermal coupling