Thermal management of fuel cell units and systems

摘要

The present application describes various arrangements for and methods of operating a fuel cell system comprising one or more fuel cell unit(s), a reformer and an afterburner. The aim is to allow an efficient thermal management of the fuel cell system. The applications deals more specifically with the issues of: how to increase heat transfer through and/or from at least one face/segment/surface of a fuel cell unit in a system comprising at least two fuel cell units (e.g. by providing the neighboring sides of adjacent fuel cell stacks (503, 503'', 503''') with a reduced level of insulation compared to the other sides of the fuel cell stacks); how to increase regulation and control of the thermal environment surrounding an individual fuel cell unit; how to better exploit the exhaust streams from a system comprising at least two fuel cell units; how to reduce the time to initiate chemical reaction or start-up in a fuel cell unit in a system comprising at least two fuel cell units. These arrangements and methods might be particularly of interest in the context of a combined heat and power system including a fuel cell system.