Fuel cell system having optimized output
AssigneeSony Corporation
InventorsShinichi Uesaka, Takashi Tomita
Life of this patent
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Abstract
The present invention provides a fuel cell system that has a fuel cell portion including one or more unit cells, a fuel tank for storing fuel used in the unit cells, and a control portion for controlling the fuel cell portion. The number of unit cells is optimized so that a total amount of energy, which is outputted from the fuel cell system as a function of the number of unit cells or of an electrode area, shows a maximum value or a nearly maximum value. Thus, the amount of energy may be maximized or made to be equal to or more than a predetermined value. Accordingly, target devices to be supplied with power from the fuel cell system may be used for a longer time.
Claims2
A fuel cell comprising:
- a fuel cell portion having one or more unit cells, each including paired electrodes and an electrolyte, and a fuel tank for storing a fuel that is supplied to the unit cells,
- wherein, n denotes a number of unit cells or a total area of the electrodes;
- and
- wherein, n is greater than nmin, nmin represents a minimum value of n that is defined to be Wmax/wmax, where Wmax represents a maximum power demanded from the fuel cell and wmax represents the maximum output power of each unit cell and further wherein, V represents the entire outer volume of the fuel cell structure, Vc designates the volume of each of the unit cells, and Vm represents the volume of a control portion for controlling the fuel cell portion, K is a proportionality constant based on an energy density of the fuel, and the fuel cell is designed based on analysis of the equation E(n)=K·{V−(Vm+n·Vc)}/n·f(w);
- and further wherein E(n) is a total amount of energy output from the fuel cell as a function of n and f(w) is a function of output power.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.