Effect of an EDLC in a wind turbine system for hydrogen production

A method for leveling power generation was examined for a power supply system that uses wind power generation for a stand-alone radio base station. One such possible method is to convert the surplus electric power to hydrogen, which enables stable energy storage that can be later used to produce electrical energy via a fuel cell. In order to efficiently produce hydrogen from wind power, it has been suggested that an electric double layer capacitor (EDLC) can be used as the electric power buffer medium for the system. In this research, the effect of an EDLC installation in the system was examined using numerical analysis. In a system that is constantly converting electrical energy generated into hydrogen, there is an appropriate load capacity for the hydrogen generator that corresponds to the amount of the energy generated. By setting the appropriate capacity and expanding the range of load operation of the hydrogen generator, the electrical charging and discharging of the EDLC are balanced, and the buffer ability improves. As a result, even if the EDLC capacity was extremely small, it was shown to contribute to the stabilization of the amount of the hydrogen generation. Moreover, a reduction in the hydrogen generator load capacity was observed with installation of the EDLC.