Prediction and Control of Air Supply Flow in PEMFC

Air supply flow directly affects proton exchange membrane fuel cells´ (PEMFC) performance, when air supply flow exceeded PEMFC demands, lost of heat energy increased and power consumption of air-compressor increased too, so efficiency of generating current was reduced. Whereas, when air flow was under its demands, FC stack would be damaged with output power of PEMFC increasing in some extant. But in PEMFC running, air supply flow lagged FC stack output power changing, so Elman ANN was proposed to predict it in advance, and the result as given value in air supply control system. It adopted Fuzzy-PID compound control to make air supply flow following output power of PEMFC changing. Simulation results showed that Elman ANN predicted air parameters effectively, and Fuzzy-PID compound controller improved dynamic performance of air supply control system distinctly better than traditional PID controller. It satisfied PEMFC demands in electric vehicles (EV).