Recovery of the Waste Heat from Low Temperature and High Temperature Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell Using Water Based Adsorption Chiller

With the immense problem of global warming, clean energy resources are the way to salvation for the future generations. Fuel cell power plants are highly promoted to serve this as they give off zero emissions making them environment friendly. Low temperature Proton Exchange Membrane fuel cells are utilized for generating electrical energy from hydrogen gas mostly used in combined heat and power cogeneration for maximum efficiency. For a sustainable energy model, the concept of trigeneration is introduced by various researchers in which cooling is also achieved from the waste heat of the fuel cell. Moreover for an environment friendly system, adsorption chilling is the most favorable as it does not involve any chlorofluorocarbons nor any other toxins as water is the working fluid for this device. Regeneration of the adsorbent consumes waste heat from the fuel cell. The effect of using a low and/or a high temperature Fuel cell is studied when used in a trigeneration system, and it is found that despite lower efficiency of high temperature fuel, the net system efficiency would be maximum. In contrast to low temperature fuel cell, which is optimal for use in a combined heat and power cogeneration system, high temperature fuel cell serves the best cause when used in a trigeneration system. This is mainly due to the rapid drop in performance of the adsorption chiller with decreasing adsorbent regeneration temperature.