THE DEVELOPMENT OF A FUEL-CELL STACK ELECTRONIC SIMULATOR FOR ENHANCED SAFETY AND RELIABILITY DURING TEST AND TRAINING

One of the main sub-tasks of HYSOLAR, a joint Saudi-German research an d development program in the field of solar hydrogen, is the investiga tion and characterisation of phosphoric acid fuel cells (PAFC). To fac ilitate this, a fully automated data acquisition and control (DAC) sys tem for fuel cell stacks was developed at KACST's Solar Village. In or der to ensure that the test and training procedures were as safe and r eliable as possible, an electronic simulator for the fuel cell stacks was also developed. This paper discusses the background and concept, a nd describes the development and operational characteristics of the si mulator. Copyright (C) 1996 International Association for Hydrogen Ene rgy.