Search Results

The growing need for a sustainable worldwide mobility is leading towards a paradigm shift in the automotive industry. The increasingly restrictive regulations on vehicle emissions are indeed driving all of the world-leading road vehicles manufacturers to redesign the concept of transportation by developing new propulsion solutions. To this aim, a gradual electrification strategy is being adopted, and several hybrid electric solutions, such as extended-range electric vehicles with reciprocating engines or fuel cells, already represent a valid alternative to conventional vehicles powered by fossil fuels. Despite their appealing features, these hybrid propulsion systems present some drawbacks, mainly related to their complex architecture, causing high overall dimensions, weight and costs, which pose some limitation in their use for small-size vehicles.

Owe to their high electrical energy density, lithium-ion batteries are the most employed technologies in electrified vehicles, whose market share is growing very fast. As a matter of fact, their thermal management is of crucial importance to keep the operating temperature within an appropriate range, as this might greatly affect performance and durability of such devices. Heat generation during cyclic charge and discharge processes, occurring during a vehicle mission, may cause critical temperature variations and, therefore, a suitable thermal management is indispensable. This is particularly true for fuel cell hybrid electric vehicles, where the battery undergoes more severe thermal stresses than in battery electric vehicles, due to higher operating C-rates.

The growing concern about Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions led institutions to further reduce the limits on vehicle-related CO2 emissions. Therefore, car manufacturers are developing vehicles with low environmental impact, like Hybrid-Electric Vehicles (HEVs), which in the series architecture employ an Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) coupled with an electric generator for battery recharging, thus extending the range of a Battery Electric Vehicle (BEV). For this kind of application, small four-stroke Spark Ignition (SI) engines are preferred, as they are a proven and reliable solution to increase the driving range with very low environmental impact. In series hybrid-electric powertrains, the ICE is decoupled from the drive wheels, then it can operate in a steady-state high-efficiency working point, regardless of the power required by the mission profile. The benefits of lean combustion can be exploited to increase efficiency and reduce CO2 and NOx emissions.

The port-logistic sector has a crucial role in goods transport, as the 85-90% of international trade is achieved by means of maritime routes. The latest reports from the International Maritime Organization show that the port-logistic related activities are an important source of air pollution, both for the use of large auxiliary power systems on ships, which operate during port stays, as well as for the employment of fossil fueled road vehicles for on-site operations. As a matter of fact, the most important maritime facilities are located nearby urban areas and therefore reduction of the environmental impact in ports becomes of primary importance. Thus, in the pursuit of a greener in-port mobility, a progressive replacement of fossil fuels with cleaner alternatives must be promoted. This paper presents the analysis of the performance of a hydrogenfueled plug-in fuel cell/battery hybrid vehicle for cargo-handling in roll-on and roll-off port operations.

Water removal from Proton Exchange Membrane (PEM) Fuel Cell (FC) mainly involves two phenomena: some of the emerging droplets will roll on the Gas Diffusion Layer (GDL), others may impact channel walls and start sliding along the airflow direction. This different behaviour is linked to the hydrophobic/hydrophilic nature of the surface the water is moving on. In this paper, the walls of the channel of a FC were characterized by applying optical techniques. The deposition of droplets on the channel wall led to an evaluation of the proper range for Contact Angle Hysteresis (CAH = 55° - 45°), and due to the high wettability of the surface, droplets dimension was defined with a dimensionless parameter B/H. Under high crossflow condition (15 m/s) a sliding behaviour was observed. The channel features determined through image processing were used as boundary conditions for a 2D CFD two phase simulation employing the Volume of Fluid (VOF) model to keep track of the fluids interface.