scholarly journals Scaling up Studies on PEMFC Using a Modified Serpentine Flow Field Incorporating Porous Sponge Inserts to Observe Water Molecules

Molecules ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 286
Author(s):  
Muthukumar Marappan ◽  
Rengarajan Narayanan ◽  
Karthikeyan Manoharan ◽  
Magesh Kannan Vijayakrishnan ◽  
Karthikeyan Palaniswamy ◽  
...  

Flooding of the cathode flow channel is a major hindrance in achieving maximum performance from Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells (PEMFC) during the scaling up process. Water accumulated between the interface region of Gas Diffusion Layer (GDL) and rib of the cathode flow field can be removed by the use of Porous Sponge Inserts (PSI) on the ribs. In the present work, the experimental investigations are carried out on PEMFC for the various reaction areas, namely 25, 50 and 100 cm2. Stoichiometry value of 2 is maintained for all experiments to avoid variations in power density obtained due to differences in fuel utilization. The experiments include two flow fields, namely Serpentine Flow Field (SFF) and Modified Serpentine with Staggered provisions of 4 mm PSI (4 mm × 2 mm × 2 mm) Flow Field (MSSFF). The peak power densities obtained on MSSFF are 0.420 W/cm2, 0.298 W/cm2 and 0.232 W/cm2 compared to SFF which yields 0.242 W/cm2, 0.213 W/cm2 and 0.171 W/cm2 for reaction areas of 25, 50 and 100 cm2 respectively. Further, the reliability of experimental results is verified for SFF and MSSFF on 25 cm2 PEMFC by using Electrochemical Impedance Spectroscopy (EIS). The use of 4 mm PSI is found to improve the performance of PEMFC through the better water management.

2019 ◽  
Vol 969 ◽  
pp. 461-465
Author(s):  
Matha Prasad Adari ◽  
P. Lavanya ◽  
P. Hara Gopal ◽  
T.Praveen Sagar ◽  
S. Pavani

Proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) system is an advanced power system for the future that is sustainable, clean and environmental friendly. The flow channels present in bipolar plates of a PEMFC are responsible for the effective distribution of the reactant gases. Uneven distribution of the reactants can cause variations in current density, temperature, and water content over the area of a PEMFC, thus reducing the performance of PEMFC. By using Serpentine flow field channel, the performance is increased. Two types of serpentine flow field channels are implemented such as curved serpentine flow field channel and normal serpentine flow field channels. The result shows that curved serpentine flow field channel gives better current density and power density, thus increasing the performance of PEMFC.


2009 ◽  
Vol 193 (1) ◽  
pp. 249-257 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nik Suhaimi Mat Hassan ◽  
Wan Ramli Wan Daud ◽  
Kamaruzzaman Sopian ◽  
Jaafar Sahari

2014 ◽  
Vol 592-594 ◽  
pp. 1728-1732 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Muthukumar ◽  
P. Karthikeyan ◽  
V. Lakshminarayanan ◽  
A.P. Senthil Kumar ◽  
M. Vairavel ◽  
...  

The geometrical and flow parameters are governing the performance of the Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell (PEMFC). The flow channels are used for distributing the reactants uniformly throughout the active area of fuel cell. Among different flow field designs, the serpentine flow field can give better performance to the PEM fuel cell. This paper numerically investigates the effects of the serpentine flow field with different number of passes. The 2 pass, 3 pass and 4 pass serpentine flow field designs of same rib size and channel size were modelled and analyzed using commercially available software package. From the polarization curves and performance curves drawn using the numerical results, the performance of three flow channel designs were compared and the maximum power densities of each design were found


2014 ◽  
Vol 592-594 ◽  
pp. 1687-1691
Author(s):  
Pal Vaibhav ◽  
P. Karthikeyan ◽  
R. Anand

As fossil fuels are becoming less reliable and more costly, the Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell (PEMFC) is emerging as the primary candidate to replace the stationary and transport applications. In this study numerical simulation on PEMFC is done by commercially available Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) software. A three-dimensional, model of a single PEM Fuel cell with serpentine flow field design has been used for the study. The numerical model is 3-D steady, incompressible, single phase and isothermal includes the governing of mass, momentum, energy, and species along with electrochemical equations. All of these equations are simultaneously solved in order to get current flux density and H2, O2and H2O fractions along the flow field design.


2000 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sukkee Um ◽  
C. Y. Wang

Abstract A three-dimensional computational study based on the finite volume method is carried out for proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cells with a Nation 117 membrane and an interdigitated flow field on the cathode. Emphasis is placed on obtaining a fundamental understanding of fully three-dimensional flow in the air cathode and how it impacts the transport and electrochemical reaction processes. For the first time, fully three-dimensional results of the flow structure, species profiles and current distribution are presented for PEM fuel cells with the interdigitated flow field. The model results show that forced convection induced by the interdigitated flow field in the backing layer substantially improves mass transport of oxygen to, and water removal from, the reaction zone thus leading to a higher cell current density as compared to that of the serpentine flow field. The computations also indicate a need to account for water condensation and ensuing gas-liquid two-phase flow and transport in the porous cathode at high current densities. The present computer model can be used as a design or diagnostic tool for fuel cell cathodes with complex structural flow fields.


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