Metal hydride bed system model for renewable source driven Regenerative Fuel Cell

A Regenerative Fuel Cell system, driven by renewable energy sources, has the potential to overcome the intermittent nature of renewable energy and become a reliable and feasible solution for small power stationary systems, producing electricity without pollutants. The present work describes a new system model for a metal hydride hydrogen storage bed (based on an AB5-type material) integrated into a Regenerative Fuel Cell system. The model has been validated against experimental data obtained from a Savannah River National Laboratory metal hydride bed at different operating conditions and has been integrated into a Regenerative Fuel Cell system using TRNSYS to simulate the behavior of the overall system for selected scenarios. Results show the technical feasibility of the Regenerative Fuel Cell concept with short term energy storage (i.e. hydrogen storage) and suggest useful solutions to make the system adaptable to long term storage scenarios as well. (C) 2013 Published by Elsevier B.V.