Hardware-Based Simulation of a Fuel Cell Turbine Hybrid Response to Imposed Fuel Cell Load Transients
- Georgia Inst. of Technology
Electrical load transients imposed on the cell stack of a solid oxide fuel cell/gas turbine hybrid power system are studied using the Hybrid Performance (HyPer) project. The hardware simulation facility is located at the U.S. Department of Energy, National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL). A computational fuel cell model capable of operating in real time is integrated with operating gas turbine hardware. The thermal output of a modeled 350 kW solid oxide fuel cell stack is replicated in the facility by a natural gas fired burner in a direct fired hybrid configuration. Pressure vessels are used to represent a fuel cell stack's cathode flow and post combustion volume and flow impedance. This hardware is used to simulate the fuel cell stack and is incorporated with a modified turbine, compressor, and 120 kW generator on a single shaft. For this study, a simulation was started with a simulated current demand of 307 A on the fuel cell at approximately 0.75 V and an actual 45 kW electrical load on the gas turbine. An open loop response, allowing the turbine rotational speed to respond to thermal transients, was successfully evaluated for a 5% current reduction on the fuel cell followed by a 5% current increase. The impact of the fuel cell load change on system process variables is presented. The test results demonstrate the capabilities of the hardware-in-the-loop simulation approach in evaluating hybrid fuel cell turbine dynamics and performance.
- Research Organization:
- National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL), Pittsburgh, PA, Morgantown, WV, and Albany, OR (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE - Office of Fossil Energy (FE)
- DOE Contract Number:
- None cited
- OSTI ID:
- 915353
- Report Number(s):
- DOE/NETL-IR-2007-034; TRN: US200817%%472
- Resource Relation:
- Journal Volume: 2006; Conference: ASME International Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition, Chicago, IL, Nov. 5-10, 2006
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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