The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Jun. 03, 2003
Filed:
Dec. 20, 2000
Prabhakar Singh, Richland, WA (US);
Mehrdad Teimor, Northville, MI (US);
Walter Franklin Clark, Plymouth, WI (US);
Visteon Global Technologies, Inc., Dearborn, MI (US);
Abstract
An electrical storage device is coupled in parallel to a fuel cell contained within a fuel cell power generation system. The electrical storage device is either a battery pack, a plurality of capacitors, or a plurality of supercapacitors and is capable of electrochemically oxidizing a quantity of reformer gas contained within an anode chamber of the fuel cell during transient load conditions by charging from a preset state of charge towards full capacity. The energy storage device thereby prevents large quantities of unoxidized reformer gas from entering a chamber of a combuster during transient load conditions, unoxidized reformer gas that generates a tremendous amount of heat when burned that can corrode or damage the combuster. The energy storage device discharges the excess charge when the fuel cell power generation system returns to normal load conditions or during transient load conditions when the amount of reformer gas entering the anode chamber has been reduced so that the amount of unoxidized reformer gas entering the combuster is maintained at a nearly constant level.