Determining characteristics of reagent storage and generation systems for marine submersible with electrochemical generator

Abstract

Autonomy of the marine submersibles is specified by the type of energy, fuel and oxidizers they use. As a rule, marine underwater objects of small displacement with a short underwater mission time are equipped with lithium-ion batteries. A number of the submersible power plants have air-independent energy, which allows using an electrochemical generator (ECG) as energy source fueled by hydrogen and applying oxygen as oxidizer. Each method of storing reagents as part of an ECG power plant has been assessed promising. Using an ECG power plant is determined by the possibility of placing on a marine underwater object the amounts of hydrogen and oxygen necessary to perform a specific underwater mission. There have been considered the issues of placing the reagents (hydrogen and oxygen) necessary for ECG functioning as part of an air-independent power plant of a marine submersible. There are given the dependencies to determine necessary reagent amounts on the submersible to perform an underwater mission. Cryogenic oxygen storage has been proved the most acceptable option for large-displacement marine underwater objects. Numerical values of the hydrogen and oxygen mass are obtained for the hypothetical ECG capacity. The possibilities of placing a balloon hydrogen storage system as the most acceptable for placement on small non-nuclear submarines and autonomous unmanned submersible apparatus are considered. Types of hydrogen tanks capable to operate in a wide range of environmental parameters at internal hydrogen pressure over 40 MPa are given. Available arrangement of tanks with hydrogen and oxygen outside the hull of an autonomous unmanned submersible is presented and the main dependencies for calculating the capacity of a balloon storage system of reagents subject to the gas properties are given.