A Non‐Intrusive Signal‐Based Method for a Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell Fault Diagnosis

Abstract

This paper presents an experimental study dealing with a non‐intrusive signal‐based method for a fault diagnosis of a proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC). The aim of this tool is to define a specific signature of different operating conditions. First, a healthy state has to be defined: an operating condition with fixed parameters values for current, temperature, pressure is used as a reference state. When the operating conditions divert from this state of functioning, a fault is considered. Thanks to the wavelet transform of different signals from the fuel cell system, a signature can be extracted and linked to the considered operating conditions. The energy contents of the wavelet transform is used as an indicator of the state‐of‐health (SoH) of the fuel cell system with the purpose to detect deviations from healthy state operating conditions and to detect the fault related to. The diagnosis tool presented in this paper is based on existing signals acquired on the fuel cell system, in order to minimize the number of actual sensors. The other goals are to minimize the number of extracted parameters from the fuel cell system and to be as less intrusive as possible in the fuel cell system.

A Comparative Study of Wavelet‐based Descriptors for Fault Diagnosis of Self‐Humidified Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells

“…Wavelet decomposition involves dividing a mother wavelet into its approximation components A j , which reveal information at low frequencies, and its detail components D j , which contain information at higher frequencies . This is shown in Figure A.…”

“…The coefficients C of a detail D at level j can be used to compute the energy of the signal over k samples as is shown in Eq. : …”

“…The results from continuous and discrete wavelet transforms have been interpreted or modified in a multitude of manners. The primary methods involve (i) examining the coefficients directly , (ii) wavelet decomposition and wavelet packet decomposition , , and (iii) using the coefficients to determine the impedance of the fuel cell . Debenjak et al.…”

“…Pahon et al. determine the state of health of a PEMFC stack using the air pressure drop between the inlet and outlet and use the relative wavelet energy to distinguish between faulty states. In a similar manner, Pei et al.…”

Temperature Control for Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell based on Current Constraint with Consideration of Limited Cooling Capacity

“…Proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) is considered to be the most promising candidate for the next generation power source of clean energy vehicles, due to its high power density, rapid start‐up, low operating temperature and no emission of pollutants , . In recent years, significant advancements have been made in the research and development of PEMFC, yet durability and cost are considered as two barriers towards its commercialization . Especially, the fuel cell temperature is a key factor affecting the durability of PEMFC components, parametric variations as well as the overall system performance directly .…”