High-Efficiency Fuel Cell Power Conditioning System With Input Current Ripple Reduction

A high-efficiency fuel cell power conditioning system with input current ripple reduction is proposed. The proposed system consists of a high-efficiency high-step-up current-fed resonant push-pull converter and a full-bridge inverter. The converter conserves inherent advantages of a conventional current-fed push-pull converter such as low input-current stress and high voltage conversion ratio. Also, a voltage-doubler rectifier is employed in order to remove the reverse-recovery problem of the output rectifying diodes and provide much higher voltage conversion ratio. The current ripple reduction control without an external component is suggested. Therefore, the proposed system operates in a wide input-voltage range with a high efficiency. By using a current-ripple reduction control, the input current ripple is furthermore reduced. A 1.5-kW prototype is implemented with input-voltage range from 30 to 70 V. Experimental results show that minimum efficiency at full load is about 92.5% and that ripple current is less than 2% of the rated input current.

[1]  I. Barbi,et al.  A ZVS clamping mode-current-fed push-pull DC-DC converter , 1998, IEEE International Symposium on Industrial Electronics. Proceedings. ISIE'98 (Cat. No.98TH8357).

[2]  Slobodan Cuk,et al.  A three-switch high-voltage converter , 1995, Proceedings of 1995 IEEE Applied Power Electronics Conference and Exposition - APEC'95.

[3]  Abraham Pressman,et al.  Switching Power Supply Design , 1997 .

[4]  Jung-Min Kwon,et al.  Dual Series-Resonant Active-Clamp Converter , 2008, IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics.

[5]  Daniel Hissel,et al.  Energy-Management Strategy for Embedded Fuel-Cell Systems Using Fuzzy Logic , 2007, IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics.

[6]  Sudip K. Mazumder,et al.  Effects of Electrical Feedbacks on Planar Solid Oxide Fuel Cell , 2007 .

[7]  Chung-Yuen Won,et al.  Fuel Cell Generation System With a New Active Clamping Current-Fed Half-Bridge Converter , 2007, IEEE Transactions on Energy Conversion.

[8]  S.K. Mazumder,et al.  Effects of Battery Buffering on the Post-Load-Transient Performance of a PSOFC , 2007, IEEE Transactions on Energy Conversion.

[9]  S.K. Mazumder,et al.  A Ripple-Mitigating and Energy-Efficient Fuel Cell Power-Conditioning System , 2007, IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics.

[10]  T. Meynard,et al.  Interactions Between Fuel Cells and Power Converters: Influence of Current Harmonics on a Fuel Cell Stack , 2007, IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics.

[11]  Lee Jongjae,et al.  Dual Series-Resonant Active-Clamp Converter , 2008 .

[12]  P.N. Enjeti,et al.  Development of an equivalent circuit model of a fuel cell to evaluate the effects of inverter ripple current , 2004, Nineteenth Annual IEEE Applied Power Electronics Conference and Exposition, 2004. APEC '04..

[13]  D.S.L. Simonetti,et al.  An isolated DC-DC boost converter using two cascade control loops , 1997, ISIE '97 Proceeding of the IEEE International Symposium on Industrial Electronics.

[14]  Luciane Neves Canha,et al.  An electrochemical-based fuel-cell model suitable for electrical engineering automation approach , 2004, IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics.

[15]  Fred C. Lee,et al.  High-frequency quasi-resonant converter technologies , 1988, Proc. IEEE.

[16]  Rong-Jong Wai,et al.  Voltage-clamped forward quasi-resonant converter with soft switching and reduced switch stress , 2005 .

[17]  Phatiphat Thounthong,et al.  Control Strategy of Fuel Cell and Supercapacitors Association for a Distributed Generation System , 2007, IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics.

[18]  Ka Wai Eric Cheng,et al.  Design and analysis of switched-capacitor-based step-up resonant converters , 2005, IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems I: Regular Papers.

[19]  F.C. Lee,et al.  A high power-density, high efficiency front-end converter for capacitor charging applications , 2005, Twentieth Annual IEEE Applied Power Electronics Conference and Exposition, 2005. APEC 2005..

[20]  Fred C. Lee,et al.  High-efficiency, high step-up DC-DC converters , 2003 .

[21]  J. Lai,et al.  Fuel cell and power conditioning system interactions , 2005, Twentieth Annual IEEE Applied Power Electronics Conference and Exposition, 2005. APEC 2005..