Thermal Integration of Coupled SOFC System with a High-Performing Metal Hydride Storage

A. Mossadegh Pour[1], A. Dhira [1], R. Steinberger-Wilckensa[1]
[1]Department of Chemistry, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham, United Kingdom
Published in 2013

Auxiliary Power Units can play an important role in reducing vehicle emissions, especially in diesel and kerosene driven vehicles. In conventional vehicles the electricity supply comes from a generator that is directly coupled to the propulsion engine. New generation of fuel cell APUs exclusively use Solid Oxide Fuel Cells with some developments in high temperature polymer electrolyte membranes gradually emerging. COMSOL Multiphysics® was used to study the coupling of a Solid Oxide Fuel Cell and high temperature metal hydride storage supplemented with auxiliary hydrogen tank. This enables complete understanding of the systems behavior as well as optimizing the system by using different parameters in the simulation process during the warming up and operation process and aids in the design of the metal hydride tank and auxiliary hydrogen tank.