Title :
Steam reformer/burner integration and analysis for an indirect methanol fuel cell vehicle
Author :
Sundaresan, Meena ; Ramaswamy, Sitaram ; Moore, Robert M.
Author_Institution :
Fuel Cell Vehicle Modeling Program, California Univ., Davis, CA, USA
Abstract :
Fuel cell vehicles powered using hydrogen/air fuel cells have received a lot of attention recently as possible alternatives to internal combustion engines. However, the combined problems of on-board hydrogen storage and the lack of hydrogen infrastructure represent major impediments to their wide-scale adoption as replacements for IC engine vehicles. On-board fuel processors that generate hydrogen from on-board liquid methanol (and other hydrocarbons) has been proposed as possible alternative sources of hydrogen needed by the fuel cell. This paper discusses the impact of proper thermal integration between two major components of the fuel processor (reformer and burner) on the dynamic operation of an on-board fuel processor for a fuel cell vehicle. The fuel processor uses the steam reformation of methanol to produce the requisite hydrogen. Since the steam reformation is an endothermic process, the thermal energy required is supplied by a catalytic burner. During dynamic operation of the fuel cell vehicle, the dynamics of the fuel processor become very critical and these dynamics are very strongly influenced by the extent of thermal integration between the reformer and the burner. In order to study these dynamics, the authors developed a fuel processor model in Matlab/Simulink modeling environment
Keywords :
air; chemistry computing; electric vehicles; electrochemistry; engineering computing; fuel; fuel cells; hydrogen; hydrogen economy; steam; H2-O2; Matlab/Simulink; catalytic burner; computer simulation; hydrogen infrastructure; hydrogen/air fuel cells; indirect methanol fuel cell vehicle; on-board fuel processors; on-board hydrogen storage; on-board liquid methanol; steam reformation; steam reformer/burner integration; thermal energy; Fuel cell vehicles; Fuel cells; Gases; Heat transfer; Hydrogen; Internal combustion engines; Mathematical model; Methanol; Process design; Vehicle dynamics;
Conference_Titel :
Energy Conversion Engineering Conference and Exhibit, 2000. (IECEC) 35th Intersociety
Conference_Location :
Las Vegas, NV
Print_ISBN :
1-56347-375-5
DOI :
10.1109/IECEC.2000.870952