Dynamic Characteristics of a PEM-FC/Woody Biomass Engine Hybrid Micro-grid

Abstract

If the micro-grid is introduced into an urban area, it will be expected that the energy cost of a distributed power supply and emission of greenhouse gas can be reduced. To date, authors have investigated the operating method that connects distributed proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEM-FC) in a power network and cooperates with it [41, 59]. Although the generation efficiency of a PEM is high, greenhouse gas discharges by the reforming reaction of city gas. On the other hand, micro-combined heat and power (micro-CHP) using a small-scale Stirling engine generator (SEG) has been examined in the UK as an energy system for individual houses [60, 61]. By using woody biomass so that carbon dioxide may circulate, the greenhouse gas amount of emission of a power generation system can be decreased. Therefore, the introduction of SEG using woody biomass is effective in emission control of greenhouse gas [62–64]. However, compared with an internal combustion engine or a fuel cell, the generation efficiency, volume efficiency, equipment cost, etc. of the conventional SEG are small. The energy supply system using the micro-grid can reduce equipment cost compared with the method of introducing generating equipment into each house. Moreover, the energy equipment linked to the micro-grid can help, for example to minimize the amount of greenhouse gas emission. Thus, in this chapter, the dynamic characteristics of the power of the independent micro-grid using hybrid cogeneration (PWHC) of PEM-FC and SEG using woody biomass are investigated.