Background
An electrochemical fuel cell is a device that is capable of converting hydrogen and an oxidant into electrical energy and reaction products. The inner core component of the device is a Membrane Electrode (MEA), which is composed of a proton exchange Membrane and two porous conductive materials, such as carbon paper, sandwiched between two surfaces of the Membrane. The interface between the membrane and the carbon paper contains uniformly and finely dispersed catalyst for initiating electrochemical reaction, such as metal platinum catalyst. The electrons generated in the electrochemical reaction process can be led out by conductive objects at two sides of the membrane electrode through an external circuit to form a current loop.
At the anode end of the membrane electrode, fuel can permeate through a porous diffusion material (carbon paper) and undergo electrochemical reaction on the surface of a catalyst to lose electrons to form positive ions, and the positive ions can pass through a proton exchange membrane through migration to reach the cathode end at the other end of the membrane electrode. At the cathode end of the membrane electrode, a gas containing an oxidant (e.g., oxygen), such as air, forms negative ions by permeating through a porous diffusion material (carbon paper) and electrochemically reacting on the surface of the catalyst to give electrons. The anions formed at the cathode end react with the positive ions transferred from the anode end to form a reaction product.
In a pem fuel cell using hydrogen as the fuel and oxygen-containing air as the oxidant (or pure oxygen as the oxidant), the catalytic electrochemical reaction of the fuel hydrogen in the anode region produces positive hydrogen ions (or protons). The proton exchange membrane assists the migration of positive hydrogen ions from the anode region to the cathode region. In addition, the proton exchange membrane separates the hydrogen-containing fuel gas stream from the oxygen-containing gas stream so that they do not mix with each other to cause an explosive reaction.
In the cathode region, oxygen gains electrons on the catalyst surface, forming negative ions, which react with the hydrogen positive ions transported from the anode region to produce water as a reaction product. In a proton exchange membrane fuel cell using hydrogen, air (oxygen), the anode reaction and the cathode reaction can be expressed by the following equations:
and (3) anode reaction: h 2 →2H + +2e
And (3) cathode reaction: 1/2O 2 +2H + +2e→H 2 O
In a typical pem fuel cell, a Membrane Electrode (MEA) is generally placed between two conductive plates, and the surface of each guide plate in contact with the MEA is die-cast, stamped, or mechanically milled to form at least one guide groove. The flow guide polar plates can be polar plates made of metal materials or polar plates made of graphite materials. The fluid pore channels and the diversion trenches on the diversion polar plates respectively guide the fuel and the oxidant into the anode area and the cathode area on two sides of the membrane electrode. In the structure of a single proton exchange membrane fuel cell, only one membrane electrode is present, and a flow guide plate of anode fuel and a flow guide plate of cathode oxidant are respectively arranged at two sides of the membrane electrode. The guide plates are used as current collector plates and mechanical supports at two sides of the membrane electrode, and the guide grooves on the guide plates are also used as channels for fuel and oxidant to enter the surfaces of the anode and the cathode and as channels for taking away water generated in the operation process of the fuel cell.
In order to increase the total power of the whole proton exchange membrane fuel cell, two or more single cells are generally connected in series into a stack by a direct stacking method or connected into a stack by a flat paving method. In the direct-stacking and serial-type battery pack, two surfaces of one polar plate can be provided with flow guide grooves, wherein one surface can be used as an anode flow guide surface of one membrane electrode, and the other surface can be used as a cathode flow guide surface of another adjacent membrane electrode, and the polar plate is called a bipolar plate. A series of cells are connected together in a manner to form a battery pack. The battery pack is generally fastened together by a front end plate, a rear end plate, and tie rods to form one body.
A typical battery pack generally includes: (1) The fuel (such as hydrogen, methanol or hydrogen-rich gas obtained by reforming methanol, natural gas and gasoline) and the oxidant (mainly oxygen or air) are uniformly distributed in the diversion trenches of the anode surface and the cathode surface; (2) The inlet and outlet of cooling fluid (such as water) and the flow guide channel uniformly distribute the cooling fluid into the cooling channels in each battery pack, and the heat generated by the electrochemical exothermic reaction of hydrogen and oxygen in the fuel battery is absorbed and taken out of the battery pack for heat dissipation; (3) The outlets of the fuel gas and the oxidant gas and the corresponding guide channels can carry liquid and vapor water generated in the fuel cell when the fuel gas and the oxidant gas are discharged. Typically, all fuel, oxidant, and cooling fluid inlets and outlets are provided in one or both end plates of the fuel cell stack.
The proton exchange membrane fuel cell can be used as a power system of all vehicles, ships and other vehicles, and can also be used as a portable, movable and fixed power generation device.
At present, when the fuel cell power generation system is used as a vehicle or ship power system or a mobile or fixed power station, the stability of the fuel cell for long-term operation must be ensured.
In order to ensure the stability of the fuel cell in long-term operation, the proton exchange membrane used in the membrane electrode of the proton exchange membrane fuel cell at present needs water molecules to exist for moisture preservation in the operation process of the cell, because only hydrated protons can freely pass through the proton exchange membrane and reach the cathode end of the electrode from the anode end of the electrode to participate in electrochemical reaction. Otherwise, when a large amount of dry air or hydrogen is supplied to and leaves the fuel cell, water molecules in the proton exchange membrane are easily carried away, and protons cannot pass through the proton exchange membrane, so that the internal resistance of the electrode is increased sharply, and the performance of the cell is decreased sharply. The hydrogen or air supplied to the fuel cell is typically humidified to increase the relative humidity of the hydrogen or air entering the fuel cell to prevent water loss from the proton exchange membrane.
Currently, there are two main types of humidification devices used in pem fuel cells:
1. before the dry hydrogen or air and the purified water enter the fuel cell, the dry hydrogen or air and the purified water directly collide in the humidifying device to make water molecules and hydrogen or air molecules form gaseous air and water molecules which are uniformly mixed, and after water-vapor separation, the hydrogen or air which reaches a certain relative humidity enters the fuel cell.
2. The dry hydrogen or air and the pure water are not directly contacted in the humidifying device before entering the fuel cell, but are separated by a film which can allow water molecules to freely permeate but not allow gas molecules to permeate, when the dry hydrogen or air flows through one side of the film and the pure water flows through the other side of the film, the water molecules can automatically permeate through the other side of the film from one side of the film, so that the air molecules and the water molecules are mixed to reach air with certain relative humidity. Such membranes may be proton exchange membranes such as Nafion membranes from dupont, and the like.
When the fuel cell power generation system is used as a vehicle or ship power system or a mobile or fixed power station, the output power generally needs to be changed along with the change of the working condition of a driver or the electricity consumption condition of a user; especially when the fuel cell power system is used as a vehicle and ship power system, the working condition changes very frequently, and when the working condition of the vehicle and the ship changes from an idle state to a starting acceleration state, the output power of the fuel cell power generation system is required to change from small to large immediately.
The change of the output power of the fuel cell power generation system requires the flow of the fuel hydrogen, the air and the cooling fluid supplied to the fuel cell to change, so as to meet the requirement of adapting to the change of the power output of the fuel cell and improve the power generation efficiency of the fuel cell power generation system.
Since the fuel cell power generation system support system itself must consume a certain amount of power to operate power generation. Among the power components that are mainly consumed are: 1. a delivery device that delivers air to the fuel cell stack; 2. a hydrogen circulation pump; 3. a cooling fluid circulation delivery pump; 4. some components related to automatic control, such as a controller; and controlling and executing components such as an electromagnetic valve, a cooling fan and the like.
All consumed power of the self-consumed power components accounts for 10-20% of the total output power of the whole fuel cell stack. Therefore, in order to improve the power generation efficiency of the entire fuel cell power generation system, when the output power of the fuel cell power generation system varies greatly, a dynamic response of a power consuming device that supports the operation of the fuel cell power generation system itself is also required in principle. For some devices with larger power consumption, such as: and the air delivery pump, the hydrogen circulating pump, the cooling fluid circulating pump and the like realize dynamic control. Generally speaking, when the fuel cell power generation system is under the full load rated power output condition, the three larger power consumption devices are also in the maximum power consumption rated working state, and when the fuel cell power generation system is under the small power output condition, even under the standby or idling condition, the speed of the motor in the three larger power consumption devices is regulated to reduce the power consumption to the minimum.
Therefore, when the output power of the fuel cell power generation system changes, the flow rates of the fuel hydrogen, the air, and the cooling fluid supplied to the fuel cell are required to change so as to satisfy the output power change. However, the two technologies of the humidifier in the existing fuel cell power generation system have the following technical defects in the dynamic response control for realizing the correlation between the flow rates and the output power of the fuel hydrogen, the air and the cooling fluid supplied to the fuel cell power generation system:
1. the humidifying devices of the two technologies are generally based on the rated working temperature of the fuel cell power generation system in the rated working state and the corresponding air and hydrogen flow; the humidifier designed based on the pressure and cooling fluid flow parameters can make the fuel cell power generation system stably work under rated working condition for a long time, and the corresponding air and hydrogen flows and working pressure can be humidified by the humidifier to be just suitable for the fuel cell to work under rated state, wherein the relative humidity is about 70-95%, and the humidifier is very suitable for the high-efficiency operation and the service life of the fuel cell.
However, when the output power of the fuel cell power generation system is low or the fuel cell power generation system is in an idle state, the flow rates of the fuel hydrogen, the air and the cooling fluid required to be supplied to the fuel cell are low, so that the over-humidification (the relative humidity reaches 100%) is easily caused when the fuel hydrogen and the air with small flow rates pass through a large fixed humidification device, and the water accumulation inside the fuel cell stack is easily caused.
2. When the output power of the fuel cell power generation system is large, even at the peak power output of short-time excess power, the flow rates of the fuel hydrogen, air and cooling fluid supplied to the fuel cell are required to be maximized. This high flow rate of hydrogen and air matched to the peak power is not enough to be humidified by the stationary humidifying device, i.e. the predetermined relative humidity cannot be reached.
3. The humidifier usually depends on the waste heat of the fuel cell to reach a predetermined working temperature, and if the fuel cell power generation system does not reach the rated working temperature (about 70 ℃), the working temperature of the humidifier also does not reach the rated working temperature. Generally, the degree of humidification of the humidifying device to hydrogen and air is not related to the engineering design of the humidifying device, but is related to the working temperature, and the higher the working temperature is, the higher the degree of humidification is. Therefore, when the fuel cell power generation system has not reached the rated operating temperature, the humidification of the hydrogen and air flow which are originally matched with the rated power is often insufficient, that is, the requirement of the rated relative humidity cannot be met.
4. The humidity of the air is also related to the temperature and humidity of the atmospheric environment. Generally, under the weather conditions of high temperature and high humidity, when air passes through the fixed humidifying device, excessive humidification is easily caused; under the conditions of low temperature and low humidity, insufficient humidification can be caused when air passes through the fixed humidifying device. And the humidity of the air entering the stack and the rotation speed of the humidifying motor are not in a linear and corresponding relationship.
The humidifying devices of the two technologies are fixed, and cannot realize dynamic humidification adjustment on the dynamic conditions of some fuel cell power generation systems. This can result in the fuel cell stack often being in either an excessively humidified or insufficiently humidified condition, which can seriously affect the performance, or even performance degradation, and lifetime of the fuel cell stack.
In order to overcome the technical defects, shanghai Shenli science and technology Limited company invented a fuel cell with a dynamic control device (invention patent application No.: 200410016609.4, utility model patent application No.: 400420020471.0), which comprises a fuel cell stack 1, a hydrogen cylinder 2, a pressure reducing valve 3, an air filter 4, an air compression supply device 5, water-vapor separators 6, 6', a water tank 7, a water pump 8, a radiator 9, a hydrogen circulating pump 10, a hydrogen path high-efficiency humidifying device 11, an air path high-efficiency humidifying device 12, a hydrogen path humidifying adjustable speed motor 13, and an air path humidifying device adjustable speed motor 13'; the device is characterized by further comprising a hydrogen gas path inlet fuel cell stack hydrogen gas relative humidity sensor 14, a hydrogen gas path inlet fuel cell stack hydrogen gas temperature sensor 15, an air path inlet fuel cell stack air relative humidity sensor 16, an air path inlet fuel cell stack air temperature sensor 17 and a cooling fluid path inlet fuel cell stack cooling fluid temperature sensor 18; the hydrogen path efficient humidifying device 11 and the air path efficient humidifying device 12 can dynamically control the humidifying degree of air and hydrogen. The relative temperature and humidity of hydrogen entering the fuel cell stack through the hydrogen relative humidity sensor 14 and the temperature sensor 15 are detected, the rotary humidifier 11 which is arranged in the hydrogen path and can dynamically control the humidification is arranged in the hydrogen path, and the inner container of the humidifier can be driven to rotate through a brushless motor with speed regulation and frequency modulation, so that the purpose of adjusting the humidification degree of the hydrogen is achieved; the invention can realize high-efficiency operation and operation under the best working condition of the fuel cell under any working condition with power output requirement. However, no specific description is given as to how to control the temperature and humidity of the fuel cell and how to implement the fuel cell.
Disclosure of Invention
The present invention is directed to overcome the above-mentioned deficiencies of the prior art, and to provide a temperature and humidity sensor for a fuel cell, which can dynamically control the temperature and humidity of the fuel cell.
The purpose of the invention can be realized by the following technical scheme: the temperature and humidity sensor applied to the fuel cell comprises a humidity sensitive element and a temperature sensitive element, and is characterized in that the humidity sensitive element and the temperature sensitive element are designed on the same chip with an A/D converter and a serial interface circuit and are connected with a microprocessor through a data line and a clock line, and the microprocessor simulates a clock signal, sends a command and reads data and dynamically controls the air humidity and temperature, the hydrogen humidity and temperature of the fuel cell.
The humidity sensitive element is a capacitive polymer, and the temperature sensitive element is made of an energy gap material.
The power supply voltage of the temperature and humidity sensor is 2.4-5.5V, after the sensor is electrified, the sensor waits for a period of time to complete a 'sleep' state, and no command needs to be sent in the period.
And a filter capacitor is arranged between power supply pins of the temperature and humidity sensor.
The microprocessor is in communication synchronization with the temperature and humidity sensor through serial clock input.
And a pull-up resistor is arranged on the data line and connected with the working voltage for pulling up.
The data is read by a serial data tri-state gate which changes state after the falling edge of the serial clock input clock and is only valid on the rising edge of the serial clock input clock.
The microprocessor drives the serial data to pull the signal to a high level through an external pull-up resistor at a low level.
The humidity of the air is adjusted by adjusting the rotating speed of the humidifying rotary barrel.
Compared with the prior art, the temperature and humidity sensor applied to the fuel cell has the advantages of quick response and strong interference resistance, and the fuel cell can realize high-efficiency operation and operation under the optimal working condition under the working condition of any power output requirement.
Detailed Description
The present invention will be further described with reference to the following examples.
The present embodiment adopts the Shanghai Shenli company patent (invention patent application No.: 200410016609.4, and practical novel patent application No.: 400420020471.0) "a fuel cell with dynamic control device", and the fuel cell can realize high-efficiency operation and operation under the optimal working condition under any working condition with power output requirement, not only can have the optimal fuel efficiency, but also can improve the working stability and greatly prolong the working life. The relative humidity and temperature of the fuel cell are calculated using the following method:
relative humidity
To compensate for the non-linearity of the humidity sensor to obtain accurate data, it is proposed to correct the readings using the following formula:
compensation of the temperature dependence of relative humidity
Due to the significant difference between the actual temperature and the test reference temperature of 25 ℃ (-77 ° f), the temperature correction factor of the humidity sensor should be considered:
temperature of
Temperature sensors developed from the bandgap material PTAT (proportional to absolute temperature) have excellent linearity. The digital output may be converted to a temperature value using the following equation:
example 1
The embodiment of the invention adopts the fuel cell power station system, and the temperature and the humidity of air entering the electric pile must be measured and controlled in order to enable the electric pile to operate in the optimal working condition.
Fig. 2 shows a highly integrated chip SHT1x27 of a temperature and humidity sensor for controlling air temperature and humidity in a fuel cell power plant system, which provides digital output of full-scale calibration, the sensor includes a capacitive polymer humidity sensor 19 and a temperature sensor 20 made of a bandgap material, the two sensors are designed on the same chip via an amplifier 21 and a 14-bit a/D converter and a serial interface circuit, and are verified by a verification memory 22, and are connected with a clock line 24 and a data line 25 via a two-wire interface and a CRC check 23.
Referring to FIG. 3, which is a schematic diagram of the interface between SHT1x27 and the microprocessor 26, the supply voltage of SHT1x is 2.4-5.5V, and after the sensor is powered up, it waits for 11mS to complete the "sleep" state, during which no command is sent, and a 100nF filter capacitor is added between the power pins 28 (VDD, GND). The serial interface technology applied by the SHT1x is optimized in the aspects of sensor signal reading and power consumption; but with I 2 The C interface is not compatible. The serial clock input (SCK) is used for communication synchronization between the microprocessor and SHT1x, and there is no minimum SCK frequency since the interface contains completely static logic. Serial DATA (DATA) tri-state gate for DATA reading, DATA being at SCKThe clock changes state after the falling edge and is only active on the SCK clock rising edge. During DATA transfer, DATA must remain stable while the SCK clock is high. To avoid signal collision, the microprocessor should drive DATA low, requiring an external pull-up resistor 29 (e.g., 10 kQ) to pull the signal high.
FIG. 4 shows a schematic diagram of the SHT1x temperature and humidity sensor interface to the ARM microprocessor in a fuel cell engine operating at 3.3V.P0.17 and P0.18 for a bidirectional I/O port the DATA line must be pulled up with a 10K pull-up resistor 29,3.3V, programmed to simulate clock signals through P0.17, and send commands and read DATA through P0.18.
In order to operate the fuel cell under the optimum condition, the temperature and humidity of the air entering the fuel cell stack must be controlled, and the humidity of the air can be adjusted by adjusting the rotating speed of the humidifying rotary barrel. Since the humidity of the air entering the electric pile and the rotating speed of the humidifying motor are not in a linear and one-to-one correspondence relationship, the humidity of the air is also related to the temperature and the humidity of the environment. Therefore, the data of the relationship between the air humidity and the rotating speed of the humidifying motor and the temperature and humidity of the environment are obtained through a plurality of experiments. Therefore, the humidity of the air entering the galvanic pile can be accurately controlled. The electric pile is enabled to work under the optimal working condition.
Example 2
The embodiment of the invention adopts the fuel cell power station system, and the temperature and the humidity of hydrogen entering the electric pile must be measured and controlled in order to enable the electric pile to operate in the optimal working condition.
Referring to fig. 2, a highly integrated temperature and humidity sensor chip SHT1x for controlling hydrogen temperature and humidity in a fuel cell power plant system provides full-scale calibrated digital output, the sensor includes a capacitive polymer humidity sensor and a temperature sensor made of energy gap material, the two sensors, a 14-bit a/D converter and a serial interface circuit are designed on the same chip, the sensor has excellent quality, ultra-fast response, strong anti-interference capability and extremely high performance-price ratio.
Referring to fig. 3, the supply voltage of sht1x is 2.4-5.5V, and after the sensor is powered on, it waits for 11mS to complete the "sleep" state, during which no command is sent, and a 100nF filter capacitor can be added between the power pins (VDD, GND). The serial interface technology applied by the SHT1x is optimized in the aspects of sensor signal reading and power consumption; but with I 2 The C interface is not compatible. The serial clock input (SCK) is used for communication synchronization between the microprocessor and SHT1x, and there is no minimum SCK frequency since the interface contains completely static logic. A serial DATA (DATA) tri-state gate is used for reading of DATA, which changes state after the falling edge of the SCK clock and is only valid on the rising edge of the SCK clock. During DATA transfer, DATA must remain stable while the SCK clock is high. To avoid signal collision, the microprocessor should drive DATA low, requiring an external pull-up resistor (e.g., 10 kQ) to pull the signal high.
Referring to fig. 4, the SHT1x temperature and humidity sensor in the fuel cell engine is interfaced to the ARM microprocessor at 3.3v.p0.17 operating voltage and P0.18 is a bidirectional I/O port the DATA line must be pulled up with a 10K pull-up resistor at 3.3V, programmed to simulate the clock signal through P0.17, and send commands and read DATA through P0.18.
In order to operate the fuel cell at an optimum condition, the temperature and humidity of the hydrogen gas entering the fuel cell stack must be controlled, and the humidity of the hydrogen gas can be adjusted by adjusting the rotation of the humidifier inner container. Since the humidity of hydrogen entering the electric pile and the rotating speed of the humidifying motor are not in linear and one-to-one correspondence, the humidity of hydrogen is also related to the temperature and the humidity of the environment. Therefore, the data of the relationship between the humidity of the hydrogen and the rotating speed of the humidifying motor and the temperature and the humidity of the environment are obtained through a plurality of experiments. Therefore, the humidity of the hydrogen entering the galvanic pile can be accurately controlled. The electric pile is enabled to work under the optimal working condition.