Experimental test on a fuel cell - supercapacitor hybrid power supply for a digital still camera

Today, the consumer market calls for high-performance power supply systems. Existing sources and technologies are not abreast of portable electronics trends, thus pressing both the academic and industrial research to focus on innovative technologies. Customers´ requirements lead to a growing interest in longer-lasting power, fast transient response power supply systems and a minimization of system weight, volume and cost. In this paper, a fuel cell-supercapacitor hybrid power supply for a Digital Camera is proposed, although the control algorithm can be efficiently applied to any portable device. The power management system also provides the load levelling function, optimizing the hydrogen consumption. The stack current is directly controlled and a multiple-steady-state control technique is implemented, optimizing the hybrid source performances. The hybrid power supply is neither affected by the fuel cell transient response nor by the supercapacitor bank runtime. Experimental results on a laboratory prototype, powering a Fujifilm S5500 digital camera, are shown.