Patent application number | Description | Published |
20100248046 | METHOD OF CREATING PARTICLE SIZE DISTRIBUTION MODEL, METHOD OF PREDICTING DEGRADATION OF FUEL CELL CATALYST USING THE METHOD OF CREATING PARTICLE SIZE DISTRIBUTION MODEL, AND METHOD OF CONTROLLING FUEL CELL USING THE METHOD OF PREDICTING DEGRADATION OF FUEL CELL CATALYST - A particle size distribution creating method includes a particle size range determining step, an integrating step of integrating the frequency of appearance of particles within the particle size range determined in the particle size range determining step, a division point determining step of determining particle sizes that provide division points, using the integral of the frequency of appearance obtained in the integrating step, and a typical point determining step of determining the minimum particle size, maximum particle size and the particle sizes of the division points as typical points. This method is characterized by assuming a particle size distribution which contains particles having the particle sizes of the respective typical points and is plotted such that the frequency of appearance of the particles having the particle size of each of the typical points is equal to the integral over each of the regions defined by the typical points, and obtaining the assumed particle size distribution as a particle size distribution model. | 09-30-2010 |
20120225367 | FUEL CELL - A fuel cell includes: a membrane-electrode assembly in which electrode catalyst layers are formed on two sides of an electrolyte membrane; and a cerium-containing layer that is formed at an outer side of at least one of the two surfaces of the membrane-electrode assembly, and that contains a cerium-containing oxide in an amount that is greater than 5 wt % and less than or equal to 30 wt % where 100 wt % is an amount of solid components except the cerium-containing oxide which form the cerium-containing layer. | 09-06-2012 |
20120276460 | FUEL CELL SYSTEM AND METHOD OF STOPPING FUEL CELL SYSTEM - In a fuel cell system, a controller is programmed to control a first gas supply mechanism to deliver a first gas containing a fuel gas to a cathode in a pre-stop process performed at a system stop of the fuel cell system. The controller is programmed to control the first gas supply mechanism to stop the delivery of the first gas in a first state where a partial pressure difference between an anode and the cathode with respect to at least the fuel gas of remaining gases in the anode and in the cathode is reduced to or below a preset reference value. | 11-01-2012 |
20120308905 | FUEL CELL SYSTEM AND CONTROL METHOD OF SAME - A fuel cell system includes a fuel cell; a cathode inflow water amount determining portion that determines a cathode inflow water amount after activation of the fuel cell; an obtaining portion that obtains a pore total volume of the cathode side catalyst layer; an operating condition determining portion that determines, based on the determined cathode inflow water amount and the obtained pore total volume, an operating condition of the fuel cell that includes a current value of current that flows through the fuel cell and an upper limit value of a period of time for which the current flows, for bringing the cathode inflow water amount within a range that is equal to or less than the pore total volume; and an adjusting portion that adjusts the current value and the period of time for which current of the current value flows, such that the determined operating condition is realized. | 12-06-2012 |
20120321976 | CONTROLLING FUEL CELL - A fuel cell system has a fuel cell that includes at least one cell with an electrolyte membrane, an index value acquirer and a controller. The index value acquirer obtains a temperature index value correlated to temperature of a short circuit area in each cell. The controller controls a control parameter of the fuel cell affecting the temperature of the short circuit area, such that the temperature index value is within a predetermined range set to make the temperature of the short circuit area lower than a decomposition temperature of the electrolyte membrane. | 12-20-2012 |
20130059215 | FUEL CELL SYSTEM AND CONTROL METHOD THEREFOR - A fuel cell system and a control method therefor are provided. The fuel cell system includes: a fuel cell formed of a plurality of stacked power generating elements; a cell voltage measuring unit detecting negative voltage in any one of the power generating elements; a control unit controlling electric power output from the fuel cell; and an accumulated current value measuring unit measuring an accumulated current value obtained by time integration of current output from the fuel cell. The control unit prestores a correlation between accumulated current values and current densities that are allowable for the fuel cell in a period during which negative voltage is generated. When negative voltage has been detected, the control unit executes output restricting process of restricting electric power output from the fuel cell so as to fall within an operation allowable range defined by the accumulated current values and current densities of the correlation. | 03-07-2013 |
20130095405 | FUEL CELL SYSTEM AND CONTROL METHOD THEREFOR - A fuel cell system includes an accumulated current value measuring unit. The accumulated current value measuring unit measures an accumulated current value by time integration of current output from the fuel cell in a period during which oxygen is produced by water-splitting reaction in an anode of a negative voltage cell. A control unit uses a first correlation between the accumulated current value in the oxygen generation period and an oxygen consumption rate in the anode and a second correlation between a current density of the fuel cell in the oxygen generation period and an oxygen production rate in the anode to obtain a current density at or below which the amount of oxygen in the anode may be reduced, and causes the fuel cell to output electric power at a current density lower than the obtained current density. | 04-18-2013 |
20130130140 | FUEL CELL SYSTEM - A fuel cell system having a fuel cell includes a power generation-time gas supplier that supplies hydrogen-containing fuel gas to an anode of the fuel cell and supplies an oxygen-containing oxidizing gas to a cathode of the fuel cell during power generation of the fuel cell. The fuel cell system also includes an anode potential rise information acquirer that acquires anode potential rise information, which represents information regarding a status of an anode potential rise of the fuel cell, after termination of supplies of the fuel gas and the oxidizing gas by the power generation-time gas supplier. The fuel cell system further includes an anode morphology variation deriver that derives an anode morphology variation representing a degree of a morphology change of a catalyst metal included in the anode, based on the anode potential rise information. | 05-23-2013 |
20130189596 | FUEL CELL SYSTEM, METHOD AND PROGRAM OF DETERMINING CAUSE OF NEGATIVE VOLTAGE, AND STORAGE MEDIUM STORING PROGRAM - A fuel cell system includes a fuel cell; a voltage measuring portion that measures a voltage of the fuel cell; an electric current adjusting portion that adjusts an electric current flowing in the fuel cell; an electric current-voltage characteristic information obtaining portion that controls the electric current adjusting portion to change the electric current, and obtains electric current-voltage characteristic information that is information indicating a correspondence relation between an electric current value and a voltage value measured by the voltage measuring portion; and a negative voltage cause determining portion that determines, if the voltage of the fuel cell is a negative voltage, a cause of the negative voltage of the fuel cell, based on the obtained electric current-voltage characteristic information. | 07-25-2013 |
20140057191 | FUEL CELL SYSTEM AND METHOD OF DETECTING ABNORMALITY OF FUEL CELL SYSTEM - A fuel cell system and an abnormality detecting method therefor is provided. The fuel cell system includes: a fuel cell that includes at least one fuel-cell cell having an anode, a cathode and an electrolyte membrane, an anode-side passage supplying and exhausting fuel gas to and from the anode, a cathode-side passage supplying and exhausting oxidation gas to and from the cathode, a voltage detecting unit detecting a fuel cell voltage, a suppressing unit setting a suppression state where, after terminating normal power generation, introduction of the fuel and oxidation gas to the anode-side and cathode-side passages and emission of the fuel and oxidation gas from the anode-side and cathode-side passages to outsides are suppressed as compared with those during the normal power generation; and an abnormality detecting unit, after setting the suppression state, detecting abnormality of the fuel cell system based on the detected voltage or a variation thereof. | 02-27-2014 |
20140114628 | METHOD OF PREDICTING DEGRADATION OF FUEL CELL CATALYST USING THE METHOD OF CREATING PARTICLE SIZE DISTRIBUTION MODEL - A particle size distribution creating method includes a particle size range determining step, an integrating step of integrating the frequency of appearance of particles within the particle size range determined in the particle size range determining step, a division point determining step of determining particle sizes that provide division points, using the integral of the frequency of appearance obtained in the integrating step, and a typical point determining step of determining the minimum particle size, maximum particle size and the particle sizes of the division points as typical points. This method is characterized by assuming a particle size distribution which contains particles having the particle sizes of the respective typical points and is plotted such that the frequency of appearance of the particles having the particle size of each of the typical points is equal to the integral over each of the regions defined by the typical points, and obtaining the assumed particle size distribution as a particle size distribution model. | 04-24-2014 |
20140272651 | FUEL CELL SYSTEM - An IR resistance of each of unit cells is measured, and a highest unit cell voltage as a threshold voltage is set based on the IR resistance and load current. The setting of the highest unit cell voltage uses map data that approximates current-voltage characteristics of a unit cell when the fuel gas is insufficiently supplied. In that case, the highest unit cell voltage is determined based on the voltage with respect to the load current obtained from the map data, and the IR loss calculated from the IR resistance and the load current. This highest unit cell voltage is compared with the measured unit cell voltage. If the unit cell voltage is below the highest unit cell voltage, the power generation of the fuel cell is stopped or restrained. | 09-18-2014 |
20150064610 | FUEL CELL MEMBRANE-ELECTRODE ASSEMBLY AND PRODUCTION METHOD THEREFOR - A production method for a fuel cell membrane-electrode assembly which may include the steps of preparing a catalyst ink that contains a metal catalyst nanoparticle of 0.3 nm to 100 nm in primary particle diameter which is not supported on a support, an electrolyte resin, and a water-based solvent and forming a non-supported-catalyst containing catalyst layer by using the catalyst ink, as a catalyst layer that is included in at least one of a fuel electrode side and an oxidant electrode side in the fuel cell membrane-electrode assembly that has a fuel electrode at one surface side of an electrolyte membrane, and an oxidant electrode at another surface side of the electrolyte membrane. | 03-05-2015 |