Design and analysis of fuel cell for standalone renewable energy system

Abstract

Summary form only given: The aim of this paper is to investigate the mathematical behavior of a PEM fuel cell in order to improve the efficiency of the system. Hydrogen is expected to play a major role in future energy economy in this context and fuel cells have shown a significant potential as an efficient solution for harnessing energy of hydrogen. The polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) is the preferred fuel cell for the standalone systems due to their inherent virtue of being compact with quick start-up and higher efficiencies with very low emissions. When this systems is employed in standalone systems that are subjected to changes in load and external operating conditions, making it important to investigate the performance of the system. This is achieved by developing a mathematical model of PEM Fuel cell using MATLAB/Simulink and it is further connected to a boost connecter to obtain a desired output.