Abstract

The automobile companies are focusing on recent technologies such as growing Hydrogen (H2) and Fuel Cell (FC) Vehicular Power Train (VPT) to improve the Tank-To-Wheel (TTW) efficiency. Benefits, the lower cost, `Eco' friendly, zero-emission and high-power capacity, etc. In the power train of fuel cell vehicles, the DC-DC power converters play a vital role to boost the fuel cell stack voltage. Hence, satisfy the demand of the motor and transmission in the vehicles. Several DC-DC converter topologies have proposed for various vehicular applications like fuel cell, battery, and renewable energy fed hybrid vehicles etc. Most cases, the DC-DC power converters are viable and cost-effective solutions for FC-VPT with reduced size and increased efficiency. This article describes the state-of-the-art in unidirectional non-isolated DC-DC Multistage Power Converter (MPC) topologies for FC-VPT application. The paper presented the comprehensive review, comparison of different topologies and stated the suitability for different vehicular applications. This article also discusses the DC-DC MPC applications more specific to the power train of a small vehicle to large vehicles (bus, trucks etc.). Further, the advantages and disadvantages pointed out with the prominent features for converters. Finally, the classification of the DC-DC converters, its challenges, and applications for FC technology is presented in the review article as state-of-the-art in research.

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

9-28-2020

Notes/Citation Information

Published in IEEE Access, v. 8.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License. For more information, see https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

https://doi.org/10.1109/ACCESS.2020.3027041

Funding Information

This work was supported in part by the Long-Term Research Grant (LRGS), Ministry of Education Malaysia, for the program titled ‘‘Decarbonisation’’ of Grid with an optimal Controller and Energy Management for Energy Storage System in Microgrid Application.

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