Fuel cell system and operating method thereof
AssigneeCummins Enterprise LLC
InventorsHonggang Wang, Xiangdong Kong
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A fuel cell system is disclosed, which includes an anode recirculation loop comprising a fuel cell stack for generating power, a flowmeter for measuring a fuel flow rate of a fuel provided into the anode recirculation loop, a current measuring device for measuring a current drawn from the fuel cell stack, a recycle ratio measuring device for measuring a recycle ratio in the anode recirculation loop, and a processor for estimating a fuel utilization of the fuel cell stack based on the measured fuel flow rate, the measured current and the measured recycle ratio. Methods for operating the fuel cell system are also disclosed.
Claims14
A fuel cell system comprising:
- an anode recirculation loop comprising a fuel cell stack for generating power, wherein the fuel cell stack includes an anode having an anode inlet and an anode outlet, and a cathode, the fuel cell stack is configured to generate power with oxygen supplied to the cathode, and the anode recirculation loop further comprises:
- a fuel reformer for receiving the fuel and a tail gas from the anode outlet of the fuel cell stack and generating a reformate at a reformer outlet, wherein the reformate at the reformer outlet is divided into a recirculated reformate which is recirculated back to the anode inlet and a slip reformate;
- a flowmeter for measuring a fuel flow rate of a fuel provided into an inlet of the reformer of the anode recirculation loop;
- a current measuring device for measuring a current drawn from the fuel cell stack by an electric load;
- a recycle ratio measuring device for measuring a recycle ratio in the anode recirculation loop defined as a flow rate ratio of the recirculated reformate to the reformate;
- and
- a processor for estimating a fuel utilization of the fuel cell stack based on the measured fuel flow rate, the measured current and the measured recycle ratio.
A fuel cell system, comprising:
- an anode recirculation loop comprising a fuel cell stack for generating power and a fuel reformer for receiving a fuel provided into the anode recirculation loop and generating a reformate at a reformer outlet, the reformate being divided into a recirculated reformate which is recirculated back to an anode inlet and a slip reformate;
- a recycle ratio measuring device for measuring a recycle ratio in the anode recirculation loop defined as a flow rate ratio of the recirculated reformate to the reformate;
- and
- a processor comprising:
- a fuel utilization model defining a mapping relationship among a fuel utilization of the fuel cell stack, a fuel utilization of the system and the recycle ratio in the anode recirculation loop,
- wherein the processor is configured to predict a fuel utilization high limit of the system from the fuel utilization model according to the measured recycle ratio and a given fuel utilization high limit of the fuel cell stack.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.