World Applied Programming, Vol (3), Issue (8), August 2013.

355-360
ISSN: 2222-2510
2013 WAP journal. www.tijournals.com

Estimation the Performance of a PEM Fuel Cell System at

Different Operating Conditions using Neuro Fuzzy (ANFIS)
Mohammad Sarvi

Masoud Safari

Faculty of Engineering and Technology,

Imam Khomeini International University,
Qazvin, Iran.
sarvi@ikiu.ac.ir

MSc student, Electrical Engineering,

Imam Khomeini International University,
Qazvin, Iran.
m.safari@ikiu.ac.ir

Abstract: Fuel cell (FC) systems have received significant attention in the last decade and they are expected to
play an important role in future power generation facilities. In this paper, Adaptive Neuro Fuzzy Inference
System (ANFIS) applied to estimate the performance of a PEM fuel cell system at different operating condition
such as temperature, pressure and air stoichiometry. The main problem with mathematical approach is that it
unjustifiably assumes a linear relationship between operating conditions and the performance of a fuel cell
system. In Our work, ANFIS was used for estimation the performance of a PEM fuel cell system at different
operating conditions. Model predictions are in good agreement with experimental data under a wide range of
operating conditions.
Keywords: Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy Inference System, PEM Fuel Cell, Operating Condition

I.

INTRODUCTION

Regarding to increase air pollution, fossil fuel demand and serious global warming, efficient energy systems and new
energy conversion processes, are urgently needed. Fuel cell (FC) systems have received significant attention in the past
15 years and they are expected to play an important role in future power generation facilities. A fuel cell is an
electrochemical device that converts chemical energy directly into electric energy by reaction of hydrogen from the fuel
and oxygen from the air [1]. With the progress in fuel cell technology, the interest in such devices for portable
applications has grown during the last decade. Fuel cells possess many key advantages, including high efficiency, quiet
operation, and clean operation with no greenhouse gas emissions [2]. PEM stands for proton exchange membrane or
polymer electrolyte membrane. PEM fuel cell is the most popular type of fuel cell because of its special characteristics
[3]. Some attractive characteristics of the PEM fuel cells include, self-starting at low temperatures and high power
density [1]. The PEM fuel cell is typically used for smaller scale uninterruptible power supplies (UPS) and for remote
power for instruments or lighting [4] also can be used in transportation sector [3]. The attractiveness of this fuel cell
system has increased significantly with improvements in many areas. However, the system is still not fully optimized in
terms of performance to be competitive with the principal competitor, the combustion engine [5]. Proton exchange
membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) performance depends on different fuel cell operating temperatures, humidification
temperatures, operating pressures, flow rates, and various combinations of these parameters. In this work, ANFIS is
trained and then used to predict the performance of a PEM fuel cell system at different operating condition such as
temperature, pressure and air stoichiometry[6]. In Our work, the neuro-fuzzy toolbox of MATLAB (ANFIS) was used.
ANFIS are a class of adaptive networks functionally equivalent to fuzzy inference systems [4]. The result shows that the
model Estimations are in a very good agreement with experimental data under different operating conditions. All these
experimental data are obtained from other similar paper such as [7] and [8].

II.

T HE EXPERIMENTAL DATA

The experimental data for voltage as functions of current at different operating condition for single fuel cell gathered
from [7] and [8].

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III.

ANFIS STRUCTURE

After the data is gathered, the next step is to normalize all the data so that each value falls between 0 and 1 where a
normalization routine was written using MATLAB Platform. The normalization is done because the membership
function must vary between 0 and 1. ANFIS provides a method for the fuzzy modeling procedure to learn information
about the historic data in order to compute the Membership function parameters that best allow the associated fuzzy
inference system to track (learn) the historic data input/output [9]. The ANFIS used in this paper consists of five
generalized bell membership functions on first input (current density) and three generalized bell membership functions
on other inputs(temperature, pressure and air stoichiometry). Figure.1 shows the ANFIS structure to the system under
study (after training).

Figure 1. ANFIS model structure

Here is a copy of ANFIS output information in Matlab command window.

ANFIS info:
Number of nodes: 305
Number of linear parameters: 135
Number of nonlinear parameters: 42
Total number of parameters: 177
Number of training data pairs: 161
Number of checking data pairs: 0
Number of fuzzy rules: 135
After training, the final MFs are shown in the figure 2.

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Mohammad Sarvi and Masoud Safari, World Applied Programming, Vol (3), No (8), August 2013.

(a)

(b)

(c)

(d)

Figure 2. Membership functions after training.

a) input 1 current density. b) Input 2 operating temperature.
c) Input3 operating pressure. d) Input 4 operating air stoichiometry.

IV.

SIMULINK

After training, the ANFIS output exported to MATLAB workspace and then the ANFIS output is used for a fuzzy logic
block in MATLAB/Simulink environment. A ramp input used as current density and the scope shows fuel cell output
voltage. Figure 3 shows estimation simulink model in MATLAB software

Figure3. Estimation simulink model

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Mohammad Sarvi and Masoud Safari, World Applied Programming, Vol (3), No (8), August 2013.

V.

RESULTS

Figure 4 shows the polarization curve at two different operating conditions using Adaptive Neuro Fuzzy Inference
System (ANFIS). In figure4a the operating temperature is 90C, the air stoichiometry is 2 and the operating pressure is 2
Mpa. Result shows that the simulated data are match with experimental data quite closely. In figure4b the operating
temperature is 70C, the air stoichiometry is 2.5 and the operating pressure is 4Mp. Also, in second condition the
simulated data are match with experimental data quite closely. Figure 5 shows the polarization curve. In Figure5a effects
of changing in operating temperature are shown. Result shows that the voltage of the PEM fuel cell increased when the
operating temperature was increased at high current density. In Figure 5b the polarization curve at different operating
pressure. Result shows that the voltage of the PEM fuel cell increased when the operating pressure was increased at high
current density. Figure5c shows the polarization curve at different air stoichiometry. Result shows that the voltage of the
PEM fuel cell increased when air stoichiometry was increased at high current density.

T=90C, Air=2, Press=2Mpa

(a)

T=70C, Air=2.5, Press=4Mpa

(b)
Figure 4. The polarization curve at different operating conditions
a) the operating temperature = 90C, the air stoichiometry i= 2 and the operating pressure= 2 Mpa.
b) the operating temperature = 70C, the air stoichiometry i= 2.5 and the operating pressure= 4 Mpa.

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Increasing Temperature

Increasing pressure

(a)

(b)

Increasing air stochiometry

(c)
Figure 5. The polarization curve at
a) Change in operating temperature b) Change in operating pressure c) Change in air stoichiometry.

VI.

CONCLUSION

This work presents a neuro- fuzzy model to estimate the performance of a PEM fuel cell system at different operating
conditions such as temperature, pressure and air stoichiometry. Even though the error was acceptable, at least for the
time being, it could be reduced further by trying to improve the ANFIS structure. More work is in fact needed in this
respect.

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Mohammad Sarvi and Masoud Safari, World Applied Programming, Vol (3), No (8), August 2013.

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