Comprehensive review of integrating fuel cells to other energy systems for enhanced performance and enabling polygeneration

Fuel cell hybridization with different energy devices is recently a highly effective method to improve the fuel cell performance for supplying power and heat, and even allow for supplying cooling energy and water. This review article performs a comprehensive review of hybridizing the fuel cell to a wide range of other energy devices and conducts a few comparisons between them. These devices include gas turbines, thermoelectric generators, electric devices (batteries, supercapacitors, solar energy, etc.), heat pumps, absorption chillers, desalination plants, and other unique configurations. It is shown that each device improves the fuel cell performance in a unique aspect; The gas turbine and thermoelectric generator increases the overall electrical efficiency of the high temperature and lower temperature fuel cells, respectively; The electric devices improve the fuel cell’s dynamic response or increase the total power output; Heat pumps can increase the total heating capacity and allow for cooling energy production; Absorption chillers allow for energy-efficient cooling energy production when the heat is not required; Desalination plants allow for freshwater production. Moreover, the energy management strategies that are commonly used in gas turbines and electric power subsystems can potentially be reused for the other above-mentioned hybrid systems.