Patent ID: 6981379

Claim:
A power supply system that supplies power to loads, comprising: a plurality of fuel cells for generating electric power and supplying the electric power to the loads; a performance storage section for storing a maximum power value indicating a maximum value of a power generation ability of each of said fuel cells; a test device for sequentially performing maximum power generation testing on at least one of said fuel cells at a predetermined time interval; an update section for updating the maximum power value of each of said fuel cells according to a result of the performance test, wherein the maximum power value is stored on said performance storage section; a power-generation-amount detection section for detecting a total of amounts of power generated and supplied by said fuel cells to the loads; and a surplus-power determination section for determining surplus power, which can be excessively generated by the power supply system, at the predetermined time interval based on a difference between a total of the maximum power values stored on said performance storage section and the total of amounts of the generated power.