| The Morgantown Personal Rapid Transit (M-PRT) system is a comfortable conveyance for travel in Morgantown, WV. One of its operating concerns is the increasing cost of heat to the guideway during winter. As the vehicles cannot run safely during snow, the system includes a guideway heating system to melt the ice from the guideway. To reduce the use of expensive natural gas, an interest has been expressed to define a hybrid heating system using an alternate fuel supply. Solid Oxide Fuel Cell (SOFC) was incorporated in the hybrid heating system. This hybrid heating system was designed, and then a detailed analysis was performed to ascertain the performance parameters like heat produced, thermal efficiency, cost of the system and the emissions involved. This high temperature fuel cell releases large amounts of usable heat in the form of exhaust gases. The exhaust gases are deprived of any undesired emissions that pollute the atmosphere. A USDOE EPSCoR WV State Implementation Award conducted by Advance Power Electricity Research Center (APERC) at West Virginia University provided support for conducting this research. |
