Design and Analysis of Fuel Cell fed High Step-Up DC-DC Converter using Modified Integral Backstepping Controller

Fue1 cells are rapidly emerging as vital energy sources, driving a transformation towards greener and efficient power solutions. However, due to the shackles in design constraints, they generally tend to be low-voltage sources that require a front-end DC-DC conversion stage to step up to a nominal value for practical usage. In this paper, we design a two level split capacitor type boost converter to deploy power from the fuel cell to a DC load application. The performance of the proposed system is heavily reliant on incorporating an optimal feedback control loop. Conventional PI and linear control techniques are undesirable due to the high overshoot and undershoot due to the linearised converter model, hence, non-linear control methods which address complex models are considered. Standard back-stepping enables smooth trajectory tracking and agile control actions, albeit resulting in a slight steady-state error. This is remedied through innovative integration of error signals, hence, the integral action will work as a constant corrector for accurate tracking, using the reduced order large signal averaged model of the proposed DC-DC converter. Finally, the work compares the proposed fuel cell converter system with modified integral backstepping control and a conventional PI control technique, using simulation results.