Mass diffusion characteristics on performance of polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells with serpentine channels of different width

Non-Dimensional Analysis of Diffusion Characteristics in Polymer Electrolyte Membrane Fuel Cells with Mismatched Anodic and Cathodic Flow Channels

“…The cathode pressure drop is 0.045 bar for A1C1 and A3C1, and 3.004 bar for A1C3 and A3C3. This is obtained using the same method for calculating the cathode pressure drop in the previous study [21]. At this time, the cathode inlet pressure can be obtained by adding the atmospheric pressure and the backpressure applied to the outlet to the cathode pressure drop.…”

“…To investigate the diffusion that occurs in the cathode flow channel when the two bipolar plates are mismatched in terms of their channel width, the dimensionless numbers Re, Sc, and Sh were calculated as in previous research [21]. These values are summarized in Table 1.…”

“…The results also showed a wide anodic channel not only improves the vertical diffusion but also the overall diffusion, which has a positive effect on mass transport. In the same way as in the previous research [21], a correlation of mismatched cases is derived from the calculated non-dimensional numbers in Table 1. This is as follows:…”

“…In a previous study [21], we analyzed the variation in the performance of fuel cells by changing the operating pressure and channel width of the serpentine bipolar plate. As the channel width was decreased and the operating pressure was increased, the maximum power density, which is a performance index of fuel cells, was enhanced.…”

“…This study hypothesized that the mismatched channel would affect performance to some extent. In order to arrive at this hypothesis, an experiment was conducted with the mismatched situation, and a pressurized condition was also applied following the previous study [21]. Quantitative performance was secured for the experiment conducted in this way, and analysis was attempted by introducing a dimensionless number.…”