A 10kW-scale Distributed Power Plant of Natural Gas-Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell

Abstract A 10 kW-scale natural gas fueled proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) distributed power plant is presented in this paper, which is designed for cogeneration of power and heat. With homemade catalysts for CO removal in a two-stage methanation process and integrated reactor in the fuel processing system, the reformed fuel with CO molar fraction less than 10 −5 is obtained for the fuel cell stack. Based on Matlab/Simulink/Stateflow and xPC Target platform, a rapid control prototype (RCP) is developed for real-time condition management, signal tracking and parameter tuning, data storing, and man-machine interaction. In a typical running with 4.3 kW stack power, the hydrogen production efficiency, gross power generation efficiency and heat recovery efficiency approach to 76%, 41% and 50%, respectively. The peak stack power reaches 7.3 kW. Though there is still considerable distance to long-term operation at 10 kW-scale net power generation, it is a milestone for the PEMFC-based stationary application in China.