Multi-level simulation platform of SOFC–GT hybrid generation system Cheng Bao a,b, *, Yixiang Shi b , Chen Li b , Ningsheng Cai b , Qingquan Su a a Department of Thermal Science and Energy Engineering, School of Mechanical Engineering, University of Science and Technology Beijing, Beijing 100083, PR China b Key Laboratory for Thermal Science and Power Engineering of Ministry of Education, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, PR China article info Article history: Received 10 April 2009 Accepted 5 May 2009 Available online 10 June 2009 Keywords: Solid oxide fuel cell Gas turbine Multi-level modeling Simulation platform abstract A self-developed simulation platform of natural gas internal reforming solid oxide fuel cell (IRSOFC)–gas turbine (GT) hybrid generation system was described in this paper. It fully reflected the concept of multi-level and hierarchical modeling. For SOFC, there are the general electrochemical model including both H 2 and CO oxidation, the advanced elec- trochemical model considering surface diffusion and competition absorption, the mech- anistic transport model and its approximate analytical solution. With a set of uniform governing equations for both planar and tubular SOFCs, description of flow and heat transfer in cell-level models provides the boundary conditions for the different types of electrode-level models. And the models with different complexity of other balancing components were also developed for different system requirements. Via the interface configuration and graphic specification in the commercial environment of gPROMS, it fully realized the flexible configuration and modular design for the different cases. By comparison with the experimental data of the Siemens–Westinghouse 220 kW demon- stration SOFC–GT hybrid generation system, our model library was validated with better performance than the advanced power system analysis tool (APSAT). And the simulation platform can be further used for the performance prediction, system optimization and controller design. ª 2009 Professor T. Nejat Veziroglu. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Fuel cell is a clean and efficient energy conversion device which directly converts chemical energy of fuel into elec- tricity. As the representative of high-temperature fuel cells, solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) can be combined with gas turbine (GT) to form the SOFC–GT hybrid generation system, which is considered to be the most potential candidate for distributed power system, power station and can also be used in the optimization of other efficient energy technologies. Modeling and simulation plays an important role in the development of SOFC–GT hybrid generation technology. In recent years, there have been many works about the cell-level and system-level modeling and analyses. The state-of-the-art mechanistic SOFC models have been developed to the multi- dimensional, non-isothermal, transient ones using tech- nology of the computational fluid dynamics [1]. The work of National Fuel Cell Research Center (NFCRC) and National Energy Technology Laboratory in America and Genova University in Italy is the representative modeling and analysis * Corresponding author. Key Laboratory for Thermal Science and Power Engineering of Ministry of Education, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, PR China. Tel.: þ86 10 62333682; fax: þ86 10 62333542. E-mail address: baocheng@mail.tsinghua.edu.cn (C. Bao). Available at www.sciencedirect.com journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/he 0360-3199/$ – see front matter ª 2009 Professor T. Nejat Veziroglu. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.ijhydene.2009.05.047 international journal of hydrogen energy 35 (2010) 2894–2899