Energy and exergy analyses of protonic ceramic fuel cell/gas turbine/organic Rankine cycle hybrid systems with methanol and octane steam reformers

In this study, two hybrid systems based on protonic ceramic fuel cell (PCFC) are proposed and investigated for their thermodynamic characteristics and system efficiencies. Methanol and octane are used as fuel. Effects of air flow rate, fuel utilization factor U_f, and anode off-gas recycling (AOGR) were also investigated. The results show that the system using methanol has a higher system energy efficiency (79%) compared to octane (70%). The proposed systems generally have higher efficiency than published systems running on methane. Furthermore, the system energy efficiency can be significantly improved by reducing the air flow rate due to increasing the operating temperature of each component. PCFCs with lower U_f are recommended to install AOGR to keep the system operating at high efficiency and power output.