• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2008.11b
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• pp.2144-2148
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• 2008

Kerosene-driven solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) system with reformer, desulfurizer and after-burner was mainly developed for this study. Originally the system was developed for 1kW class SOFC system for residential power generation (RPG) application. As a preliminary study of 1kW class SOFC system operation, a short stack was applied to the system. The short stack consists of 7 cells of $10cm{\times}10cm$ area and was operated at $720^{\circ}C$. The effect of anode inlet gas composition to stack performance was investigated. Firstly, I-V characteristics of SOFC with different fuel of kerosene and hydrogen were studied. Secondly $CH_4$ internal reforming was performed at various anode inlet gas compositions of $H_2$, $CH_4$ and $H_2O$. Through these experiments the effects of each anode inlet gas component to stack performance were analyzed and the significant operating parameters were iscussed.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2010.06a
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• pp.128.2-128.2
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• 2010

For stationary 1kW-class fuel cell systems to be used widely, it is essential to achieve dramatic improvements in system durability as well as cost reduction. In order to address this engineering challenge, it is important to develop innovative technologies associated with BOP components. According to this background, in 2009, the Korean Government and "Korea Institute of Energy Technology Evaluation and Planning(KETEP)" launched into the strategic development project of BOP technology for practical applications and commercializations of stationary fuel cell systems, named "Technology Development on Cost Reduction of BOP Components for 1kW Stationary Fuel Cell Systems to Promote Green-Home Dissemination Project". The objectives of this project are to develop fundamental technologies to meet these requirements, and to improve the performance and functionality of BOP components with reasonable price. The project consortium consists of Korea's leading fuel cell system manufacturers, BOP component manufacturers which technologically specialized, and several research institutions. This paper is to provide a summary of the project, as well as the achievements made through the 1st period of the project(2009~2010). Several prototypes of BOPs - Cathode air blowers, burner air blowers, preferential oxidation air blowers, fuel blowers, cooling water pumps, reformer water pumps, heat recovery pumps, mass flow meters, valves and power conditioning systems - had been developed through this project in 2010. As results of this project, it is expected that a technological breakthrough of these BOP components will result in a substantial system cost reduction.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2010.11a
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• pp.111.1-111.1
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• 2010

This paper focuses on a systematic configuration of steam reforming fuel processor, particularly designed for small and medium sized hydrogen production application. In a typical integration of the fuel processor, there exist significant temperature gradients over the entire system which has negative effect on both catalyst life-time and system performance. Also, the volumetric inefficiency should be avoided to obtain the possible compactness for the commercial purpose. In the present work, the computational analysis will be performed to gain the fundamental insight on the transport phenomena and chemical reactions in the reformer consisting of preheating, steam reforming (SR), and water gas shift (WGS) reaction beds in the flow direction. Also, the fuel processing system includes a top-fired burner providing necessary thermal energy for endothermic catalytic reactor. A fully two-dimensional numerical modeling for a integrated fuel processing system is introduced for in-depth analysis of the heat and mass transport phenomena based on surface kinetics and catalytic process. In the model, water gas shift reaction and decomposition reaction were assumed to be at equilibrium. A kinetic model was developed and then computational results were compared with the experimental data available in the literature. Finally, the case study was done by considering the key parameters, i.e. steam to carbon (S/C) ratio and temperature. The computer-aided models developed in this study can be greatly utilized for the design of advanced fast-paced compact fuel processors research.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Illuminating and Electrical Installation Engineers
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• v.18 no.6
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• pp.205-212
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• 2004

In this paper the design of a 1-[KVA] fuel cell powered line-interactive UPS system employing modular (fuel cell & DC/DC converter) blocks is proposed. The proposed system employs the two fuel cell modules along with suitable DC/DC converters and these modules share the DC-Link of the DC/AC inverter. A supercapacitor module is also employed to compensate for the instantaneous power fluctuations and to overcome the slow dynamics of the fuel processor. The energy stored in the supercapacitor can also be utilized to handle the overload conditions for a short time period. Due to the absence of batteries, the system satisfies the demand for an environmentally friendly and dean source of the energy. A complete design example illustrating the amount of hydrogen storage required for 1hr power outage, and sizing of supercacpacitor for transient load demand is presented for a 1-[KVA] UPS.

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Military Science and Technology
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.528-535
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• 2017

Fuel cells have been spotlighted in the world for being highly efficient and environmentally friendly. A hydrogen which is the fuel of fuel cell can be obtained from a number of sources. Hydrogen source for operating the polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cell(PEMFC) in the current underwater environment, such as a submarine and unmanned underwater vehicles are currently from the metal hydride cylinder. However, metal hydride has many limitations for using hydrogen carrier, such as large volume, long charging time, limited storage capacity. To solve these problems, we suggest diesel reformer for hydrogen supply source. Diesel fuel has many advantages, such as high hydrogen storage density, easy to transport and also well-infra structure. However, conventional diesel reforming system for PEMFC requires a large volume and complex CO removal system for lowering the CO level to less than 10 ppm. In addition, because the preferential oxidation(PROX) reaction is the strong exothermic reaction, cooling load is required. By changing this PROX reactor to hydrogen separation membrane, the problem from PROX reactor can be solved. This is because hydrogen separation membranes are small and permeable to pure hydrogen. In this study, we conducted the pressurized diesel reforming and water-gas shift reaction experiment for the hydrogen separation membrane application. Then, the hydrogen permeation experiments were performed using a Pd alloy membrane for the reformate gas.

• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.45 no.6
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• pp.656-662
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• 2007

Fuel reformer using plasma and shift reactor for CO oxidation were designed and manufactured as $H_2$ supply device to operate a polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cell (PEMFC). $H_2$ selectivity was increased by non-thermal plasma reformer using GlidArc discharge with Ni catalyst simultaneously. Shift reactor was consisted of steam generator, low temperature shifter, high temperature shifter and preferential oxidation reactor. Parametric screening studies of fuel reformer were conducted, in which there were the variations of the catalyst temperature, gas component ratio, total gas ratio and input power. and parametric screening studies of shift reactor were conducted, in which there were the variations of the air flow rate, stema flow rate and temperature. When the $O_2/C$ ratio was 0.64, total gas flow rate was 14.2 l/min, catalytic reactor temperature was $672^{\circ}C$ and input power 1.1 kJ/L, the production of $H_2$ was maximized 41.1%. And $CH_4$ conversion rate, $H_2$ yield and reformer energy density were 88.7%, 54% and 35.2% respectively. When the $O_2/C$ ratio was 0.3 in the PrOx reactor, steam flow ratio was 2.8 in the HTS, and temperature were 475, 314, 260, $235^{\circ}C$ in the HTS, LTS, PrOx, the conversion of CO was optimized conditions of shift reactor using simulated reformate gas. Preheat time of the reactor using plasma was 30 min, component of reformed gas from shift reactor were $H_2$ 38%, CO<10 ppm, $N_2$ 36%, $CO_2$ 21% and $CH_4$ 4%.

• Plant Journal
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• v.10 no.3
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• pp.45-51
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• 2014

This study performs several experiments on a newly developed temperature safety system that can be used for residential building heating systems, the heat source of which is derived from a conventional fuel cell. Prior to this, the hot water made from a fuel cell was not used in residential housing but just went to waste. The present safety system is installed in the current underfloor heating system. At first we used the CFD technique to develop a new heat exchanger. The fuel cell must satisfy the thermal conditions of the inlet temperature being $55^{\circ}C$ and the outlet temperature being $60^{\circ}C$. But variations in weather cause fluctuations in the heating water temperature. The experimental results show our new system capable of maintaining the temperature difference within a ${\pm}0.5^{\circ}C$ range. So we believe that our new PFMFC fuel cell stack array is a good candidate for being used in residential heating systems.

• Journal of Hydrogen and New Energy
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.305-312
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• 2011

The use of a separator to control stack temperature in a molten carbonate fuel cell was studied by numerical simulation using a computational fluid dynamics code. The stack model assumed steady-state and constant-load operation of a co-flow stack with an external reformer at atmospheric pressure. Representing a conventional cell type, separators with two flow paths, one each for the anode and cathode gas, were simulated under conditions in which the cathode gas was composed of either air and carbon dioxide (case I) or oxygen and carbon dioxide (case II). The results showed that the average cell potential in case II was higher than that in case I due to the higher partial pressures of oxygen and carbon dioxide in the cathode gas. This result indicates that the amount of heat released during the electrochemical reactions was less for case II than for case I under the same load. However, simulated results showed that the maximum stack temperature in case I was lower than that in case II due to a reduction in the total flow rate of the cathode gas. To control the stack temperature and retain a high cell potential, we proposed the use of a separator with three flow paths (case III); two flow paths for the electrodes and a path in the center of the separator for the flow of nitrogen for cooling. The simulated results for case III showed that the average cell potential was similar to that in case II, indicating that the amount of heat released in the stack was similar to that in case II, and that the maximum stack temperature was the lowest of the three cases due to the nitrogen gas flow in the center of the separator. In summary, the simulated results showed that the use of a separator with three flow paths enabled temperature control in a co-flow stack with an external reformer at atmospheric pressure.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Illuminating and Electrical Installation Engineers
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• v.22 no.5
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• pp.21-30
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• 2008

The fuel cell generation convert fuel source, and gas directly to electricity in an electro-chemical process. Unlike traditional and conventional turbine engines, the process of fuel cell generation do not burn the fuel and run pistons or shafts, and it has not revolutionary machine, so have fewer efficiency losses, low emissions and no noisy moving parts. A high power density allows fuel cells to be relatively compact source of electric power, beneficial in application with space constraints. In this system, the fuel cell itself is nearly small-sized by other components of the system such as the fuel reformer and power inverter. So, the fuel cell energy's stationary fuel cells produce reliable electrical power for commercial and industrial companies as well as utilities. In this paper, a fuel cell system has been modeled using PSCAD/EMTDC to analyze its electric signals and characteristics. Also the power quality of the fuel cell system has been evaluated and the problems which can be occurred during its operation have been studied by modeling it more detailed. Particularly, we have placed great importance on its power quality and signal characteristics when it is connected with a power grid.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.32 no.11
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• pp.849-855
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• 2008

The paper addresses modeling and analysis of the part load performance of a hybrid fuel cell system integrating a polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cell(PEMFC) and a gas turbine(GT). The system is a pressurized one where the working pressure of the PEMFC is higher than the ambient pressure. In addition to the two major components, the system also includes auxiliary parts such as a steam reformer, a humidifier, and afterburner and so on. Based on design analysis, component off-design models are incorporated in the analysis program and part load operation is simulated. The mode for the part load operation of the PEMFC/GT hybrid system is a variable rotational speed operation. The operating characteristics and variations in the system efficiency and component performance parameters at part load are analyzed.