Homogenization of the current density in polymer electrolyte fuel cells by in-plane cathode catalyst gradients

Homogenization of current density of PEM fuel cells by in-plane graded distributions of platinum loading and GDL porosity

“…However, it is achieved at the cost of sacrificing the cell performance because the overall current density is reduced. This finding agrees well with the conclusions of Santis et al (2006), in which no increase in cell performance was observed by homogenization of current density. Fig.…”

“…The graded distributions of functional components and factors that have received attention include platinum [Antoine et al 2000;Santis et al 2006;Prasanna et al 2007;Lee et al 2007;Taylor et al 2007;Srinivasarao et al 2012;Roshandel and Ahmadi 2013;Su et al 2014;Xing et al 2017], ionomer [Wang et al 2004;Xie et al 2005;Song et al 2005;Kim et al 2008;Su et al 2010;Xing et al 2017] and void space (pore) [Chu et al 2003;Roshandel et al 2005;Zhan et al 2006;Sinha et al 2007;Chen et al 2008;Huang et al 2010;Zhang et al 2016], associated with electrochemical reaction, proton migration and reactant gas transport inside the CLs, respectively. In addition, due to the significant impact of water flooding at high current densities, the graded design of hydrophobicity is of benefit to the more efficient water removal through the electrodes [Weng et al 2011;Kang et al 2012;Ito et al 2014Ito et al , 2015Ito et al , 2016.…”

A segmented fuel cell unit with functionally graded distributions of platinum loading and operating temperature

“…Within the porous electrodes of PEM fuel cells, effective electrochemical reactions only occur on the triple-phase boundaries (TPBs) sheared by void space (for gas transport), ionomer (for proton transport) and Pt/C (for electron transport). Thus, the design of functionally graded electrodes typically includes the inhomogeneous distributions of electrode porosity [8][9][10][11][12][13], ionomer loading [14][15][16][17] and catalyst loading [18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28] along both the in-plane and through-plane directions. As one of the most critical design variables, platinum loading attracts great attention due to its significant effect on reaction activity, durability and cost of the cell.…”

Feasibility of in-plane GDL structuration: Impact on current density distribution in large-area Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells

“…An in-plane gradient in catalyst distribution was proposed as a strategy to enhance the performance and the efficient use of the platinum catalyst material [14,15] and improve the current density homogeneity [16]. Moreover, the modification of the gas diffusion electrode was also proposed as a strategy to enhance both oxygen and water transport by introducing a mixed carbon fiber/carbon cloth paper as the gas diffusion layer (GDL) [17e20] or by coating the GDL with a water management layer (a graded microporous layer) [21].…”