Effects of control strategies on the transient performance of a HTPEM fuel cell system fuelled with propane

HTPEM fuel cells based on PBI-H3PO4 MEA have introduced some improvements respect to Nafion based PEM fuel cells: they withstand higher temperatures (up to 180\ub0C) and therefore CO tolerance is increased. This simplifies fuel cell operation with hydrocarbon based fuels because some purification steps in the fuel processor are avoided. In this work an experimental system composed of a steam reformer with a capacity of 1 Nm3/h of hydrogen fuelled with propane and an HTPEM fuel cell has been described. Reformer start-up transient and steady state operation have been investigated. HTPEM polarization curves have been measured at steady state condition, operating the reformer at 3 different S/C ratios