Addressing System Integration Issues Required for the Development of a Distributed Wind- Hydrogen Energy System

摘要

This paper describes the research endeavor at the University of North Dakota to create a laboratory for the characterization and testing of a 6 kW proton exchange membrane (PEM) electrolyzer and two 1.2 kW fuel cells under various operating conditions. Controlled operating temperature and unregulated DC current input are two of the primary electrolyzer investigations currently being conducted. A PEM electrolyzer model has been developed in VisSimTM and the new facility was used to experimentally verify the accuracy of the model. The test facility will serve as a starting point for various other research activities including hydrogen dew point control using thermoelectric devices, ultracapacitor experimentation and model verification, electro-impedance spectroscopy testing, and electrochemical hydrogen compression.