Experimental and numerical study on improvement performance by wave parallel flow field in a proton exchange membrane fuel cell

doi:10.1016/j.cjche.2021.07.016

中国化学工程学报 ›› 2022, Vol. 45 ›› Issue (5): 90-102.DOI: 10.1016/j.cjche.2021.07.016

Experimental and numerical study on improvement performance by wave parallel flow field in a proton exchange membrane fuel cell

Zijun Li^1,2, Shubo Wang², Sai Yao¹, Xueke Wang³, Weiwei Li², Tong Zhu¹, Xiaofeng Xie²

1 School of Mechanical Engineering and Automation, Northeastern University, Shenyang 110819, China;
2 Institute of Nuclear and New Energy Technology, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China;
3 Beijing Institute of Space Launch Technology, Beijing 100076, China

收稿日期:2021-01-09 修回日期:2021-07-24 出版日期:2022-05-28 发布日期:2022-06-22
通讯作者: Tong Zhu,E-mail:tongzhu@mail.neu.edu.cn;Xiaofeng Xie,E-mail:xiexf@mail.tsinghua.edu.cn
基金资助:
This research was supported financially by National Key Research and Development Program of China (2017YFB0103001).

Experimental and numerical study on improvement performance by wave parallel flow field in a proton exchange membrane fuel cell

Zijun Li^1,2, Shubo Wang², Sai Yao¹, Xueke Wang³, Weiwei Li², Tong Zhu¹, Xiaofeng Xie²

1 School of Mechanical Engineering and Automation, Northeastern University, Shenyang 110819, China;
2 Institute of Nuclear and New Energy Technology, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China;
3 Beijing Institute of Space Launch Technology, Beijing 100076, China

Received:2021-01-09 Revised:2021-07-24 Online:2022-05-28 Published:2022-06-22
Contact: Tong Zhu,E-mail:tongzhu@mail.neu.edu.cn;Xiaofeng Xie,E-mail:xiexf@mail.tsinghua.edu.cn
Supported by:
This research was supported financially by National Key Research and Development Program of China (2017YFB0103001).

摘要/Abstract

摘要： The performance and operation stability of proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) are closely related to the transportation of reactants and water management in the membrane electrode assembly (MEA) and flow field. In this paper, a new three-dimensional wave parallel flow field (WPFF) in cathode was designed and analyzed throughout simulation studies and an experimental method. The experimental results show that the performance of PEMFC with WPFF outperforms that of PEMFC with straight parallel flow field (SPFF). Specifically, the peak power density increased by 13.45% for the PEMFC with WPFF as opposed to PEMFC with SPFF. In addition, the flow field with area of 11.56 cm² was formed by the assembly of transparent end plate used for cathode and the traditional graphite plate used for anode. To understand the mechanism of the novel flow field improving the performance of PEMFC, a model of PEMFC was proposed based on the geometry, operating conditions and MEA parameters. The thickness of gas diffusion layers (GDL), catalytic layers (CL) and proton exchange membrane were measured by scanning electron microscope. The simulation result shows that compared with SPFF, the WPFF based PEMFC promote the oxygen transfer from flow channel to the surface of CL through GDL, and it was beneficial to remove the liquid water in the flow channel and the MEA.

关键词: Fuel cells, Transport process, Computational fluid dynamics, Flow regimes, Water management

Abstract: The performance and operation stability of proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) are closely related to the transportation of reactants and water management in the membrane electrode assembly (MEA) and flow field. In this paper, a new three-dimensional wave parallel flow field (WPFF) in cathode was designed and analyzed throughout simulation studies and an experimental method. The experimental results show that the performance of PEMFC with WPFF outperforms that of PEMFC with straight parallel flow field (SPFF). Specifically, the peak power density increased by 13.45% for the PEMFC with WPFF as opposed to PEMFC with SPFF. In addition, the flow field with area of 11.56 cm² was formed by the assembly of transparent end plate used for cathode and the traditional graphite plate used for anode. To understand the mechanism of the novel flow field improving the performance of PEMFC, a model of PEMFC was proposed based on the geometry, operating conditions and MEA parameters. The thickness of gas diffusion layers (GDL), catalytic layers (CL) and proton exchange membrane were measured by scanning electron microscope. The simulation result shows that compared with SPFF, the WPFF based PEMFC promote the oxygen transfer from flow channel to the surface of CL through GDL, and it was beneficial to remove the liquid water in the flow channel and the MEA.

Key words: Fuel cells, Transport process, Computational fluid dynamics, Flow regimes, Water management

Zijun Li, Shubo Wang, Sai Yao, Xueke Wang, Weiwei Li, Tong Zhu, Xiaofeng Xie. Experimental and numerical study on improvement performance by wave parallel flow field in a proton exchange membrane fuel cell[J]. 中国化学工程学报, 2022, 45(5): 90-102.

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Experimental and numerical study on improvement performance by wave parallel flow field in a proton exchange membrane fuel cell

Experimental and numerical study on improvement performance by wave parallel flow field in a proton exchange membrane fuel cell

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