Applied Energy 88 (2011) 68–76

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Applied Energy
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/apenergy

Experimental investigation on the dynamic performance of a hybrid PEM fuel

cell/battery system for lightweight electric vehicle application
Yong Tang a, Wei Yuan a,b,*, Minqiang Pan a, Zhenping Wan a
a
Key Laboratory of Surface Functional Structure Manufacturing of Guangdong Higher Education Institutes, South China University of Technology, Guangzhou 510640,
Guangdong, People’s Republic of China
b
School of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering, The University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW 2052, Australia

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: A hybrid system combining a 2 kW air-blowing proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) stack and a
Received 17 April 2010 lead–acid battery pack is developed for a lightweight cruising vehicle. The dynamic performances of this
Received in revised form 4 July 2010 PEMFC system with and without the assistance of the batteries are systematically investigated in a series
Accepted 29 July 2010
of laboratory and road tests. The stack current and voltage have timely dynamic responses to the load
Available online 21 August 2010
variations. Particularly, the current overshoot and voltage undershoot both happen during the step-up
load tests. These phenomena are closely related to the charge double-layer effect and the mass transfer
Keywords:
mechanisms such as the water and gas transport and distribution in the fuel cell. When the external load
Proton exchange membrane fuel cell
Hybrid power system
is beyond the range of the fuel cell system, the battery immediately participates in power output with a
Fuel cell electric vehicle higher transient discharging current especially in the accelerating and climbing processes. The DC–DC
Dynamic performance converter exhibits a satisfying performance in adaptive modulation. It helps rectify the voltage output
Transient response in a rigid manner and prevent the fuel cell system from being overloaded. The dynamic responses of other
operating parameters such as the anodic operating pressure and the inlet and outlet temperatures are
also investigated. The results show that such a hybrid system is able to dynamically satisfy the vehicular
power demand.
Ó 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction and automobile manufacturers to develop a new generation of

With the development of the automotive industry and the in-
crease of the transportation requirement, the number of vehicles
is experiencing a rapid growth all over the world, especially in
developing countries. On the contrary, the conventional unrenew-
able energy resources such as petroleum and natural gas are
decreasing because of increasing energy consumption, so that
many countries have to depend highly on oil import and suffer
higher oil prices. Moreover, the environmental problems concern-
ing the air pollution and greenhouse gas emission become more
and more serious, which have turned into global challenges. A lat-
est example was the UN Climate Change Conference opened in
Copenhagen, Denmark at the end of last year. The delegates, ex-
perts and activists from nearly 200 countries gathered to find com-
mon ground including reduction of greenhouse gas emissions,
promotion and transfer of new more eco-friendly technology and
necessary funding. Therefore, it is urgent for the governments
* Corresponding author at: Key Laboratory of Surface Functional Structure
Manufacturing of Guangdong Higher Education Institutes, South China University
of Technology, Guangzhou 510640, Guangdong, People’s Republic of China. Tel./fax:
+86 2085516947.
E-mail address: yuanweijob@yahoo.com.cn (W. Yuan).
vehicles based on environmentally–friendly technologies of energy
utilization [1].
During the recent two decades, considerable R&D activities
have concentrated on the hydrogen fuel cell which seems to be
an effective solution to mitigate the aforementioned difficulties.
The hydrogen fuel cell plays a key role in the hydrogen economy
which provides clean and sustainable energy for the people’s fu-
ture power. It is worth noting that the proton exchange membrane
fuel cell (PEMFC) has attracted more attention than other types due
to its outstanding advantages such as low-temperature operation,
quick start-up, high efficiency, zero emission, low noise and vibra-
tion. Thus, it is acknowledged to be the most promising candidate
for vehicular applications as the replacement of conventional inter-
nal combustion engine (ICE) [2,3]. It is also likely to be used for
portable and stationary power generation in a wide range of power
levels [4,5]. However, the PEMFC has to face some intractable tech-
nical and economic troubles before real commercialization in
mainstream consumer markets. For example, the PEMFC exhibits
somewhat ‘‘soft” characteristics because of its slow responses to
the external load, especially during the peak power periods or tran-
sient events [6]. Furthermore, the power supply based on a sole
PEMFC system requires higher construction cost and fuel con-
sumption. In this regard, an additional energy storage device seems

0306-2619/$ - see front matter Ó 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.apenergy.2010.07.033
 Y. Tang et al. / Applied Energy 88 (2011) 68–76
to be a good choice used as an assistant power source due to its
advantages in transient discharging ability and energy storage effi-
ciency. When the PEMFC is unable to fully satisfy the external load
demand, a supplemented power source can produce a transient
power output during the accelerating and climbing processes so
as to alleviate the sluggish response of the pure fuel cell. On the
other hand, if the PEMFC is able to provide the demanded power
by itself, its redundant electricity can be used to recharge the stor-
age device. Therefore, a hybrid system combining the PEMFC and
back-up power source appears more competent for electric vehi-
cles. For most of today’s hybrid application, the secondary batteries
are usually treated as the auxiliary energy storage systems [7–10].
Additionally, the ultra-capacitor is also regarded as a popular part-
ner to complement the fuel cells [6]. Other attractive alternatives
for energy storage include photovoltaic arrays [11], flywheels
[12] and so forth.
In previous research work, plenty of achievements were
reported concerning various PEMFC-based transportation applica-
tions. Some of them were successfully put into real-life demonstra-
tion rather than the laboratory practices or short-term road tests.
For example, in China, both the government and research institutes
have taken great efforts to develop PEMFC electric vehicles (PEM-
FCEVs) in the past ten years and successfully demonstrated so-
called green buses and cars based on PEMFC technology for the
public services during 2008 Beijing Olympic Games. And a more
extensive PEM-FCEV demonstration can be expected to be imple-
mented in course of the coming 2010 World Exposition held in
Shanghai.
Generally speaking, the power level of the fuel cell system de-
pends on the load requirement and energy management strategies.
As for the vehicular application, the fuel cell system above 10 kW
usually involves complex system design and a high cost. Such
applications involve various transportation tools such as large-
scale locomotives [13,14], city buses [15,16] and cars [17]. On
the other hand, in recent years, lightweight FCEVs (i.e. several-kilo-
watt class) have shown great prospects due to simpler system inte-
gration and lower investment risk, thereby making it more likely to
realize large-scale production and commercialization earlier. Cor-
bo and co-workers [8–10] conducted a series of work on the basis
of commercial PEMFC systems for vehicular application. Their
studies mainly focused on engineering problems and covered dif-
ferent power levels for transportation applications. They previ-
ously published a hybrid system based on a 20 kW PEMFC stack
and lead–acid batteries for minibus propulsion [8]. At the same
time, they also carried out an investigation of a low-power PEMFC
stack around 2.4 kW in a hybrid system for scooter application [9].
Recently they reported the performance of a 2 kW PEMFC stack
coupled with lithium ion batteries combined as an electric energy
storage system [10]. Jossen et al. [7] also explored the feasibility of
a hybrid system with combination of lead–acid batteries and PEM-
FCs for possible application in an electric scooter. The results sug-
gested that the high efficiency of fuel cells at partial load operation
resulted in a good fuel economy for recharging the batteries. Tang
et al. [18] developed a PEMFC boat with a battery set hybridized.
The 2 kW fuel cell stack provided the main power to run the troll-
ing motor, while the battery functioned for system starting and
acceleration. They concluded that the PEMFC system showed good
adaptation to drive a boat. Based on an early project of a 500 W
fuel cell electric bicycle [19], Hwang et al. [20] carried out a preli-
minary study on a 5 kW PEMFC system for a light-duty cruising
vehicle named MHV. They claimed that the MHV performed satis-
factorily over a hundred-kilometer driving test and would be opti-
mized on a hybrid system aiming at further improvement in
configuration and performance.
As reviewed above, most of the published literatures deal with
the PEMFC system operating thoroughly in a ‘‘close” mode. This
69
inevitably employs more external balance-of-plant (BOP) equip-
ments and requires more complicated system integration to create
necessary operational conditions. The aim of this work is to vali-
date the feasibility of a 2 kW PEMFC stack in an ‘‘open” mode to
be the main power in a hybrid system for a lightweight cruising
vehicle. In particular, the dynamic performance of the fuel cell/hy-
brid system is emphatically studied by conducting a series of lab-
oratory and road tests.
2. Experimental
2.1. Configuration of the hybrid system
In this work, a lightweight electric vehicle (YVK-J08A, Shenzhen
Yaveike Tech. Co. Ltd.) for campus cruising application was used as
the experimental target, which was modified by replacing the ori-
ginal pure-battery power system with our self-designed hybrid
system based on the PEMFC technology (see Fig. 1). The framework
of the back seat was redesigned to make enough space for the sys-
tem installation. The key components of this hybrid system in-
cluded a 2 kW air-blowing PEMFC stack, a lead–acid battery
pack, a main DC–DC converter and a central controller. Other nec-
essary components for correct system operation could be designed
or commercially available. A schematic diagram of the system con-
figuration was illustrated in Fig. 2.
Table 1 listed the detailed system parameters of the main com-
ponents in the hybrid electric vehicle. The fuel cell stack was made
up of 110 single cells with a 66 V nominal voltage. It could be oper-
ated without external gas humidification at ambient temperature.
At the anode, pure hydrogen (>99.95%) was fed into grooved flow
channels of the fuel cell bipolar plates at a controlled pressure
around 0.05–0.06 MPa. Two high-pressurized cylinders made of
aluminum alloy were used for on-board hydrogen storage. A
three-way valve was mounted to joint the two hydrogen feeding
lines. The fuel cell anode worked in a dead-end mode. An electron-
ically controlled purge valve was fixed at the anodic downstream
line to periodically drain excessive water diffusing from the cath-
ode to the anode through the polymeric membrane. And another
solenoid valve was located at the stack inlet to control the hydro-
gen feeding. While at the cathode, air was supplied through four
blowers which also acted as cooling fans to keep the fuel cell stack
at an appropriate temperature. This operating condition could be
identified as a so-called ‘‘open” or semi-integrated mode. Based
on the air-blowing cathode, the produced water cannot be easily
expelled from the cathode compartment by unpressurized air flow,
thereby improving the fuel cell’s self-humidifying ability. More
importantly, the power consumption of the air management sys-
tem extremely contributes to high parasitic losses [21]. Therefore,
such an ‘‘open” mode is able to not only simplify the system design
and integration so as to facilitate easy operation of the fuel cell sys-
tem, but also enhance the system efficiency and economy.
As mentioned in the Section 1, power storage elements are nec-
essary to assist the fuel cell system. In common circumstances, the
secondary batteries may be suitable choices, among which the
lead–acid battery has been characterized by its low cost and
acceptable efficiency for the hybrid scheme wherever the cycle life
and depth of discharge were not considered the top performance
criteria [22]. Moreover, as an assistant power source, the lead–acid
battery has also been widely validated by other research groups
[7–9]. In this study, a 48 V battery pack with eight lead–acid bat-
tery modules connected in series was utilized to cooperate with
the fuel cell system.
A self-designed DC–DC converter was interconnected between
the fuel cell system and the external load (i.e. the motor) in order
to rectify the variable stack voltage to the load required value. This
70 Y. Tang et al. / Applied Energy 88 (2011) 68–76

Fig. 1. The modified electric vehicle with a hybrid system combining the PEMFC stack and lead–acid batteries.

Fig. 2. A schematic diagram of the system configuration.

Table 1
System parameters of the hybrid electric vehicle. maximum value that depended on the input voltage range. Thus,
the rotational speed of the cooling fan could be handled automat-
Parameter Value
ically by changing the input voltage according to different power
Electric vehicle
demands, so that the air stoichiometry and stack temperature
Size (m) 3.75 (L)  1.35 (W)  1.88 (H)
Wheelbase (m) 2.58 could be controlled synchronously.
Min. turning radius (m) 4.5 In order to ensure safe and correct power distribution during
Max. speed (km h 1) 30 different stages such as start-up, normal operation and load varia-
Motor voltage (V) 48 tion, a central controller based on the AVR technology was used to
Fuel cell stack coordinate and command all the components through efficient
Number of cells 110 management of the control signals, on–off signals, serial port com-
Nominal voltage (V) 66
Nominal power (kW) 2 (0.6 V/cell)
munication, as well as various operating parameters (e.g. voltage,
Nominal current (A) 30 current, pressure, temperature). A programmed data acquisition
Lead–acid battery pack
(DAQ) unit was employed to facilitate status monitoring and data
Number of batteries 8 collection. The feedback signals and operating parameters could
Nominal voltage of a single battery (V) 6 be transmitted to a Labview-based software interface for real-time
Electric capacity of a single battery (A h) 250 (5 hr) control, and also be downloaded to the personal computer (PC)
Voltage at full charge (V) 53
through the RS232 communication port. Moreover, a remote LCD
DC–DC converter monitor was also fixed on the front instrument panel for the con-
Input voltage (V) 60–120 (adjustable)
venience of observation.
Input under-voltage protection (V) 60 ± 2
Output current (A) 10–100 (adjustable)
Output voltage (V) 5–56 (adjustable) 2.2. Dynamic test of the fuel cell/hybrid system
Voltage stability degree (%) 60.5
Ripple coefficient (%) 61
Response time (s) 0.1 Real-time experiment of the PEMFC-based hybrid system in dy-
namic conditions is of great significance to evaluate the system
performance in both laboratory and road tests. In this study, the
converter also integrated a control unit for battery charging from dynamic performance was the main focus which could reveal tran-
the fuel cell system during idle periods. The charge current in this sient mechanisms and the effects of relevant operating parameters
study was regulated at 10 A. The switch motion between the fuel (e.g. operating pressure and temperature). Before installing the hy-
cell system and the battery pack was realized by a diode which brid power system on the electric vehicle, an in-house bulb-array
could effectively control the power distribution. In addition, a ded- was used as the simulative load in order to preliminarily verify
icated controller for adaptive air flow regulation was developed by the dynamic characteristics of the fuel cell system with and with-
inputting a 5 V, 25 kHz square-wave signal with a changeable duty out assistance from the battery pack. A switch could be easily han-
cycle. The output voltage could be modulated from zero to the dled by the operator to control the battery connection. During the
 Y. Tang et al. / Applied Energy 88 (2011) 68–76 71

road test, various operating motions were involved, namely start-

up, speed-up, braking and climbing. Security measures had been
carefully checked before commencement of the real test. Espe-
cially, a series of protective procedures for the fuel cell system
security under the conditions of over-current, under-voltage,
abnormal-pressure and over-temperature must be enabled. Fig. 3
shows the photos descriptive of the in situ road tests.
Before the fuel cell system started, the central controller was
firstly activated by a key-button. Then the fuel cell system transit-
ed to the ‘‘STAND-BY” stage with an alarm buzzer ringing. During
this stage, sensors and actuators were energized and the control
board began to continuously deliver data and status signals. Subse-
quently, a button signal triggered the ‘‘STARTING” sequence. Then
the hydrogen solenoid valve opened, and the purge valve periodi-
cally cycled to fill the stack with hydrogen. While the hydrogen
feeding was regulated by the operator, the controller kept monitor-
ing the pressure value circularly. At the moment when hydrogen Fig. 4. Performance curves of the 2 kW PEMFC stack.
pressure reached 0.053 Mpa, the pulse width modulation (PWM)
was initialized, and a 24 V voltage from the battery pack was sup-
plied to the air blowers. Once the external load was connected, the to inspect the dynamic performance of the fuel cell system alone.
fuel cell system would enter the normal ‘‘RUNNING” stage until Fig. 5 describes the dynamic characteristics of the stack output
reaching a new steady state. The sampling interval was kept at (e.g. current and voltage) and DC–DC output (e.g. voltage) under
0.5 s throughout the whole experiment. a constant load controlled by a simulative bulb-array. During the
‘‘STAND-BY”stage, the hydrogen outlet valve keeps close while
the pressure increases. After 90s, the fuel cell system enters the
3. Results and discussion ‘‘STARTING” sequence when the internal pressure reaches
0.053 MPa (i.e. the starting pressure) as shown in Fig. 6. During this
For transient analysis of the hybrid system under dynamic con- stage, the fuel cell system operates under an open circuit voltage of
ditions, the output values and involved operating parameters were about 100 V. At about 145 s, the stack current begins to respond to
treated as functions of the time. The developing trend of each var- the external load demand, and subsequently experiences two step-
iable and their interrelations could be clearly observed. Fig. 4 pre- up loading actions, and finally reaches approximately 32 A. After
sents the performance curves (i.e. current vs. voltage and current 165 s, the stack voltage is reduced to 66 V, while the DC–DC output
vs. power) of the fuel cell stack, from which the power output at voltage reaches a relatively steady value of 24 V. It can be seen that
different load currents can be identified. However, in the real dy- the stack voltage and the DC–DC output voltage both have rapid re-
namic operation, the tested values may be a little different from sponses to the current changes, and could reach a steady state in a
these typical values because the road testing conditions cannot short time. Under a constant load, both of the two voltages could
be precisely controlled like those in the test platform. maintain at a steady state. Fig. 6 depicts the dynamic responses
of relevant operating parameters (e.g. anodic operating pressure,
3.1. Laboratory test of the fuel cell/hybrid system inlet and outlet temperatures) to the load changes from zero to a
constant value. It can be seen that the operating pressure gradually
In this contribution, the PEMFC stack is treated as the main increases due to the dead-end configuration and finally arrives at
power source for hybrid vehicular application. Thus, it is necessary 0.082 MPa, a maximum value preventing the fuel cell system from

Fig. 3. Photos of the real road tests: (a) Running on the planar road. (b) Climbing a slope.
72 Y. Tang et al. / Applied Energy 88 (2011) 68–76

Fig. 5. Dynamic responses of the fuel cell stack output and DC–DC output under a Fig. 7. Dynamic responses of the fuel cell stack output and DC–DC output under a
constant simulative load. step-up simulative load.

Fig. 6. Dynamic responses of the fuel cell operating parameters under a constant
simulative load. Fig. 8. Dynamic responses of the fuel cell operating parameters under a step-up
simulative load.
excessively high-pressure operation. Moreover, an increasing step-
up profile of the operating pressure can be observed, indicating
that the hydrogen accumulates inside the fuel cell while the purge
valve periodically repeats ‘‘on–off” motions with a constant cycle.
In addition, the inlet and outlet temperature increases with the in-
crease of current. At the beginning, the difference between the two
temperatures seems smaller. With the reaction going on, the inlet
temperature increases more quickly, because the reaction in the
inlet area is more acute due to abundant reactants, producing more
heat which promotes a higher temperature. Thus, the increasing
rate of the inlet temperature appears higher than the outlet.
Figs. 7 and 8 illustrate the dynamic characteristics of various
parameters under step-up load variations. It is obvious that when
the load is controlled by a regular step-up rule, the stack voltage
correspondingly feeds back in a step-down manner. From 145 s
to 955 s, the DC–DC output voltage does not vary with the increase
of current, although the stack voltage accordingly decreases. This
phenomenon can be attributed to the voltage protective mecha-
nism in the DC–DC converter. In general, during a high-current
Fig. 9. Dynamic responses of the hybrid system under a simulative load.
stage, the stack voltage is forced to be dragged down to a lower le-
vel. To avoid the fuel cell damage caused by long-term operation at
a lower voltage, the DC–DC converter help maintain a steady observed that both the two voltages respond synchronously to the
power output by sacrificing the voltage value, thereby alleviating current variation, showing great sensitivity to the load changes.
the harmful effect of high-current operation. Therefore, after Fig. 8 shows that the hydrogen pressure experiences an increasing
955 s, when the stack current climbs up to 30 A, the DC–DC output process as expected during the step-up load test. The inlet and out-
voltage responds with a prompt drop. A more detailed explanation let temperatures exhibit arc-like trends without any overshoot/
about this adaptive mechanism is specified in Fig. 9. It can be also undershoot behaviors during each stage. This result agrees well
 Y. Tang et al. / Applied Energy 88 (2011) 68–76
with that reported in our previous study on a commercial PEMFC
system [23]. However, compared with the outlet temperature,
the inlet variant increases much faster at each transient turning
point due to more produced heat, as previously mentioned.
Remarkably, the current overshoot and voltage undershoot
both happen when the load transiently increases to a next-step va-
lue. Fig. 10 shows an amplified view of these interesting behaviors.
As for the overshoot/undershoot phenomena, there may exist two
contributing factors including the charge double-layer effect and
the internal mass transfer mechanism [24]. It is well known that
in PEMFCs, a thin layer on or near the interface between the elec-
trodes and the electrolyte may act as an electrical capacitor during
the transient process, producing so-called charge double-layer ef-
fect. Thus, the charges have to take some time to accumulate or
dissipate when the current changes. On the other hand, the water
and gas transport also have great influence on the dynamic behav-
iors of the current and voltage during transience. It is known that
the abrupt load change tends to induce temporary dehydration
due to electro-osmotic drag on the anode side, and air feeding star-
vation on the cathode side [25–27]. It can be seen in Fig. 10a that,
in the low-current region (300–400 s), the load change tends to re-
sult in current overshoot and voltage undershoot. When the load
increases, the current firstly reaches a peak value and subse-
quently drops to a lower value. During this low-current stage,
the membrane wettability is not in a reasonable condition espe-
cially when the fuel cell is operated in a self-humidifying mode,
because the water produced at the cathode is still limited. Also,
the low-current operation allows a lower air flow rate. Under this
condition, the step-up load may cause critical anode dehydration
and oxygen starvation. In other words, the sudden discharge may
bring much burden on the water and gas transport, although the
power demand is still not quite high. It can be inferred that a poor
water and gas management is more likely to promote the possibil-
ity of current overshoot. After overshoot, the current goes down
until reaching a new steady state. This means that a renewed mass
balance gradually comes into being after a few seconds. Mean-
while, the voltage is dragged down to a very low value because
the higher membrane resistance caused by transient dehydration
and a lower temperature inevitably leads to a sharp drop of the
voltage, that is voltage undershoot. Subsequently, the voltage in-
creases gradually until reaching a relatively steady state. The rea-
son for this performance rejuvenation can be explained by the
fact that it may take some time for the back-diffusion water to
Fig. 10. Amplified views of the overshoot and undershoot phenomena during transient processes: (a) low-current region; (b) medium-current region; and (c) high-current
region.
73
rehydrate the anode side and accelerate water redistribution. In
the medium-current region (600–700 s) as shown in Fig. 10b, the
current overshoot and voltage undershoot phenomena also occur,
whereas a small sharp peak in reverse direction simultaneously
appears during the transient load change. Moreover, the magni-
tude of the overshoot/undershoot seems to be reduced. Also, both
the stack current and voltage spend a shorter time obtaining re-
newed steady-state values, compared with Fig. 10a. The reason
for this result may be explained by the improvement of local
non-uniformity in mass distributions. Under this condition, both
the increased produced water and air stoichiometry contributes
to the reduced peak of the stack current [24,26]. Another possible
reason can be explained by the enhanced charge double-layer ef-
fect in the transient process that has to be considered here. It is
more likely to restrict the behavioral extent of the overshoot and
undershoot. This trend becomes more evident in Fig. 10c which
shows that, in the high-current region (900–1000 s), the current
overshoot does not happen when the load increases. Similarly,
no voltage undershoot appears when the current jumps to a higher
level. This result is quite different from the case in the low-current
region (see Fig. 10a). A higher flow rate increases the air stoichiom-
etry, which helps obtain a new mass balance by alleviating water
flooding and oxygen starvation, although a higher discharging cur-
rent promotes more produced water. Thus, the mass transfer and
distribution get greatly improved during this stage. In addition,
the charge double-layer effect may further become a dominant fac-
tor influencing the dynamic behavior of the current, especially dur-
ing the high-current stage. In a word, an integrative influence of
both the charge double-layer effect and the mass transfer mecha-
nism benefits fast formation of a new steady state. On the contrary,
the transient spike-like peaks of both the current and voltage can
be observed, showing that the load change may suddenly push
up the voltage and pull down the current. This is also a different
feature, compared with Fig. 10a. Furthermore, it can be seen that,
when the load increases, the DC–DC output voltage only has a
transient fluctuation and then abruptly regains a constant value
in the steady state, showing a sensitive and rigid response to the
dynamic load change almost without any delay. This phenomenon
is determined by its function which helps modulate the ‘‘soft”
characteristics of the stack output. To sum up, both the stack and
DC–DC output voltages provide transient responses to the current
changes but have different dynamic performances in the subse-
quent time.
74 Y. Tang et al. / Applied Energy 88 (2011) 68–76

Fig. 9 presents the dynamic responses of the stack and DC–DC

output parameters in the hybrid tests. It can be seen that the fuel
cell system itself constantly provides a 30 A current output at
66 V. At about 760 s, the DC–DC output voltage suddenly drops
from 53 V to 48 V. This indicates that the DC–DC converter tends
to cut down the output value adaptively according to the carrying
capacity of the fuel cell stack alone, thereby keeping it from being
overloaded. This result is consistent with that in Fig. 7. After 890 s,
when the external load increases, the fuel cell system still main-
tains the previous power value, while the battery pack starts to
supply power assistance so as to satisfy an increased load demand.
At the beginning, a transient shoot of the battery current appears,
suggesting that the battery is able to produce a very high current in
response to a sudden discharging action. This rationale will be en-
hanced by an analysis of the data obtained in the road test (see Sec-
tion 3.2). Also, this result again illuminates the reason why an
additional storage device is necessary to supplement the fuel cell,
Fig. 12. Dynamic responses of the fuel cell operating parameters on stop-and-go
as discussed in the Section 1. Moreover, it is noticed that the DC–
random cycles in the planar road tests.
DC output voltage further decreases when the battery current in-
creases at approximately 890 s, 1020 s, and 1220 s, respectively.
These transient step-down behaviors again prove that the DC–DC ular driving cycle. The fluctuation range and frequency of these
converter can spontaneously regulate the output voltage according two variants assort well with the load current. During the normal
to the external power demand, especially when the battery shares operation in the steady state, an interesting phenomenon deserves
the load. Thus, it can be clearly identified in Fig. 9 that the DC–DC much attention: when the stack voltage keeps at a stable level, the
output voltage transiently decreases with the increase in battery DC–DC always spends some time to enhance the output and then
current. This advantageous performance is of great significance continues in a steady state. Sometimes, this period does not last
to guarantee a safe and stable operation of the fuel cell system. long so that only an uphill slope of the DC–DC output voltage
can be identified. In Fig. 12, it can be seen that the operating pres-
sure and inlet temperature both experience more severe fluctua-
3.2. Road test of the fuel cell/hybrid system tions as a result of more frequent variations of the motor power.
Comparatively, the outlet temperature still seems insensitive to
In the second stage of the experiment, a series of road tests the external load changes.
were performed to demonstrate the validity of the hybrid power Fig. 13 displays the dynamic responses of the hybrid system
system. Based on the campus landform, the tests were mainly con- with the battery combined in the planar road tests. It can be ob-
ducted on random driving cycles. Figs. 11 and 12 describe the dy- served that the battery can provide timely current output when
namic responses of various system parameters of the fuel cell the power demand for vehicular propulsion is beyond the range
system alone in the real road tests. It can be seen that both of of the fuel cell system. These results again reveal the certain phe-
the stack and DC–DC output voltages have prompt transient re- nomenon that the battery current usually rockets to a very high le-
sponses to the current changes driven by the load variations on vel transiently at the beginning of the discharging motion. During
stop-and-go driving cycles. When the vehicle speeds up, the stack the high-power periods, the current variation is mainly related
current increases, resulting in reduced output voltages of both the with the development of the battery current, because the stack
stack and DC–DC converter. When the vehicle decelerates or current no longer changes when it reaches the maximum value.
brakes, the fuel cell system stops working, making the stack volt- Thus, it can be seen that only the battery current goes down when
age return to the open circuit value. It can be seen that the output the load gradually decreases. On the other hand, during the
voltages keep in step with the current variations on such an irreg-

Fig. 11. Dynamic responses of the fuel cell stack output and DC–DC output on stop- Fig. 13. Dynamic responses of the hybrid system on stop-and-go random cycles in
and-go random cycles in the planar road tests. the planar road tests.
 Y. Tang et al. / Applied Energy 88 (2011) 68–76
Fig. 14. Dynamic responses of the hybrid system in the climbing tests.
low-power periods, the fuel cell stack alone is capable of meeting
the power demand, so that the battery output is cut off by the
diode switch. Furthermore, Fig. 14 illustrates the dynamic results
of the hybrid system in the climbing tests (see Fig. 3). After running
on the planar road, the vehicle starts to climb a slope at about 82 s.
At this moment, the battery responds with a transient current
shoot as high as 119 A and subsequently falls to approximately
75 A. When the vehicle gets over the slope, the battery stops cur-
rent output. It can be inferred that the hybrid system performs well
by enhancing the battery output during the climbing tests.
4. Conclusions
A hybrid power system combining a 2 kW air-blowing PEMFC
stack and a lead–acid battery pack is developed to drive a light-
weight electric vehicle for campus cruising. The feasibility of such
an ‘‘open” PEMFC system as the main power for vehicular propul-
sion has been proved. This contribution mainly focuses on the dy-
namic performances of both the single fuel cell system and the
hybrid system in the laboratory and road tests. A series of system
parameters is investigated, such as the stack current and voltage,
the DC–DC output voltage, the battery current, the anodic operat-
ing pressure, as well as the inlet and outlet temperatures. Based on
the systematical experiments and analysis, the following conclu-
sions can be made:
 The stack current and voltage respond transiently to the load
variations when the fuel cell system itself is able to satisfy the
power demand. When the external load is beyond the range
of the fuel cell system, the battery begins to provide power
assistance by increasing current output. The battery current
exhibits satisfying transient responses to the load changes espe-
cially during the accelerating and climbing periods.
 Current overshoot and voltage undershoot are discovered dur-
ing the transient process. These interesting phenomena derive
from an integrative influence of both the charge double-layer
effect and the mass transfer mechanisms. Particularly, the water
and gas transport and distribution in the fuel cell exert great
effects on the overshoot/undershoot behaviors in different
ranges of the current.
 The DC–DC converter shows acceptable performance in adap-
tive modulation of the output voltage according to the fuel cell
carrying capacity and load variations. It can spontaneously drag
down the output voltage to maintain a reasonable power value,
especially when the battery shares the load, thereby preventing
the fuel cell system from being overloaded.
75
 The anodic operating pressure increases during the step-up and
steady-state operations. It shows more fluctuant dynamic per-
formance following the rhythm of the current variations in
the road tests. Compared with the outlet temperature, the inlet
temperature more remarkably varies with the current changes,
showing more sensitive dynamic responses to the load varia-
tions. There is no overshoot/undershoot phenomenon happen-
ing to the inlet and outlet temperatures.
Acknowledgements
The research was supported by the key program of NSFC-
Guangdong Joint Funds of China (No. U0834002) and the program
of Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province (No.
07118064). The project (No. 2009ZM0168) financially supported
by the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities,
is also acknowledged. The authors also would like to acknowledge
the Joint-training Program (No. 2009615064) sponsored by China
Scholarship Council and the Doctorate Dissertation Innovation
Funds supported by South China University of Technology. In addi-
tion, the constructive suggestions by professor Jun Wang in The
University of New South Wales are also highly appreciated.
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