Description du sujet de thèse

This PhD proposal is part of a project entitled HYSySPEM (Optimization of HYbrid energy SyStem with multi-stack PEM fuel cells for heavy duty transportation applications), selected and funded in 2022 by the French National Research Agency (ANR) - call for projects “Programme France 2030 - PEPR Hydrogène décarboné” (https://anr.fr/fileadmin/aap/2021/selection/ia-PEPR-H2-AAP-2021-liste-projets.pdf ).
The HYSySPEM project aims to improve hybrid PEM fuel cell systems for high-power heavy-duty applications (truck, train, aircraft and ship) with a systemic approach. The optimization of electrical and fluidic architectures in a modular multi-stack approach will be carried out at several scales (fuel cell system and hybrid system) and on key components (compressor, power converter architectures). Improvements in local control and energy / power management at hybridization will be coupled with a fault-tolerant control approach for power converters and hybridization to ensure a very high level of availability. The HYSySPEM project will allow a strong scientific dissemination with a reinforced collaborative work between seven consortium partners (CEA LITEN, IFPEN, IJL, FEMTO-ST, LEMTA, AMPERE, IREENA), through the co-supervision of 8 Ph.D. thesis.
The HYSySPEM project proposes to develop and validate new architectures (electrical and fluidic) and control for the development of hybrid Fuel Cell Systems (FCS) tailored for for Heavy-Duty Vehicles (HDV). In particular, a focus will be given to i/ the fuel cell system efficiency by optimizing key components (compressor, power electronics); ii/ the fuel cell lifetime by optimizing dynamic operating conditions and the power and energy management; iii/ the fuel cell and its system lifetime by implementing fault tolerant operation; iv/ the increase of electrical power with a multi-stack approach.
More particularly, the proposed PhD will focus on original and fault tolerant power electronic architectures for hybrid Fuel Cell Systems developped in the Work Package 3, to contribute to the Work Package #4 – “Fault tolerant operation of single and multi-stack Fuel Cell hybrid systems” and to the Work Package #5 - “Development of the XiL platform and validation of the concepts” of the HYSySPEM project.
Depending on the HDV application and the power unit needed, the power electronic architectures will be different and single/multi-stacks FCS could be used. For each case, an advanced and global fault detection associated to a fault tolerant control will be done in order to adopt a global reconfiguration of the system. Thus, in the event of a fault case, fault tolerant operation can be performed, in degraded mode or not, regarding the required key performances.
The recruited PhD student will be fully involved in the HYSySPEM project and participate to all the meetings. The conducted research work wil focus on the Work Package WP4 and WP5, and more particularly on the Task 4.2 and Task 5.2, for which IJL and FEMTO-ST are leader.
The main objectives of the research to be conducted by the PhD candidate mainly relays on:
• Propose model-based or signal-based fault detection algorithms (diagnosis and identification of a fault) for active components of original power electronic architectures for single or multi-stack architectures (studied in healthy conditions in the Work package 3).
• Study of advanced remedial actions, including fault tolerant control approaches based on the reconfiguration of the multi-stack FCS performing a post-fault operation mode.
• Develop real time HIL validation of some selected fault tolerant power electronic architectures for heavy duty or maritme transportation applications.
• Validate the fault tolerant operation at small scale, on experimental test bench.
The PhD student will be jointly supervised by Philippe POURE (Full Professor at IJL) and Arnaud GAILLARD (Associate Professor at FEMTO).
You are about to obtain a MSc in Energy systems or Electronics or Electrical Engineering with strong experience in at least several of the following areas: power electronic conversion, energy management and conversion, electronic circuits and systems, modeling and simulation for power converters' control. Your profile must enables understanding the interactions in multi-disciplinary energy conversion systems (Fuel cell Systems). Excellent written and verbal communication skills in English is mandatory. Fluency in French could be also a plus, but absolutely not mandatory.

Contexte de travail

The Institute Jean Lamour (IJL) is a joint research unit of CNRS and Université de Lorraine. Focused on materials and processes science and engineering, it covers: materials, metallurgy, plasmas, surfaces, nanomaterials and electronics.
By 2025, IJL has 259 permanent staff (34 researchers, 133 teacher-researchers, 92 IT-BIATSS) and 374 non-permanent staff (136 doctoral students, 48 post-doctoral students / contractual researchers and more than 190 trainees), from some sixty different nationalities.
Partnerships exist with 150 companies and our research groups collaborate with more than 60 countries throughout the world.
Its exceptional instrumental platforms are spread over 4 sites ; the main one is located on Artem campus in Nancy.
FEMTO-ST institute is a joint research unit (UMR 6174) between the CNRS and Université Marie et Louis Pasteur, SUPMICROTECH and the UTBM. The FEMTO-ST Institute is a world-class public research laboratory with a staff of over 700. Scientific support services are organized into shared services. Scientific activity is organized into seven scientific departments and one transverse research team .The ENERGY Department which has about 120 members focuses its research activites on electrical and thermal energies. It complements the research carried out within the six other departments of FEMTO-ST through a systemic energy approach focused on the production and management of efficient, affordable and environmentally friendly energy.
All the work carried out by the department is based on theoretical (modelling, simulation) and experimental approaches related to multi-physical energy systems (electrical, thermal, mechanical, fluidic), often within the framework of national, international, industrial and academic partnerships. This work is carried out by the various teams of the department, but also in link, in a transversal and interdisciplinary way, with the six other departments of FEMTO-ST as well as the humanities and social sciences team RECITS and the UAR CNRS FCLAB. The ENERGY department also contributes to the FEMTO Engineering structure.

Le poste se situe dans un secteur relevant de la protection du potentiel scientifique et technique (PPST), et nécessite donc, conformément à la réglementation, que votre arrivée soit autorisée par l'autorité compétente du MESR.

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