Waste Heat Recovery for Fuel Cell Electric Vehicle with a Thermochemical System

Abstract

In this paper, different waste heat recovery concepts for a high temperature fuel cell range extender vehicle developed by the DLR Institute of Vehicle Concepts will be presented. These concepts use thermochemical heat storages to recover thermal energy from the powertrain waste heat and to re-use it for heating purpose before or during the drive. The focus will be on metal hydride storages, which have a higher specific energy density than the phase change energy storages and will thus be more advantageous for vehicle application. In order to investigate the developed waste heat recovery concepts in the entire vehicle, appropriate simulation models will be created in the simulation environment Modelica/Dymola, then integrated into an overall vehicle simulation model. It is found that the integration of the thermochemical heat storages into the fuel cell thermal management system leads to increase the range by up to 17 %.