Energy Storage Configuration in Fuel Cell Electric Vehicle: An Analysis on a Real Urban Mission Profile

Fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEVs) rely on a battery system to manage transient load demands and to recover braking energy. In recent years, hybrid topologies that also integrate supercapacitors have gained considerable attention, since they can improve system efficiency, driving dynamics, and component lifetime. Supercapacitors, thanks to their much higher power density compared to conventional batteries, are particularly promising for adoption in FCEVs. Most studies in the literature, however, evaluate these architectures under standardized homologation driving cycles. While such cycles provide a common benchmark for comparison, they generally exhibit less energy-intensive profiles and therefore do not fully capture the real operating demands of a vehicle. For this reason, the present work investigates the use of batteries and supercapacitors in FCEVs under an actual urban driving mission, where the route includes an experimentally measured altitude profile. This approach allows for a more realistic assessment of energy requirements. Furthermore, the analysis carried out in this study considers different powertrain configurations: the exclusive use of a battery, the sole use of a supercapacitor, and a hybrid combination of both systems. These scenarios are evaluated both for an FCEV that can only be refueled with hydrogen and for a plug-in hybrid version of the vehicle that can also recharge its battery from an external charging station.