The effect of serpentine flow-field designs on PEM fuel cell performance

Jeon, Dong Hyup

doi:10.1016/j.ijhydene.2007.11.015

Cited by 211 publications

(110 citation statements)

References 15 publications

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“…[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12] Also, ES-PEMFC accounted for the flux of protons and water across the membrane. 28 The material properties, and operational parameters used for this model are shown in Table II.…”

Section: Model Developmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Macro-Scale Analysis of Large Scale PEM Fuel Cell Flow-Fields for Automotive Applications

Shimpalee

Hirano

DeBolt

et al. 2017

J. Electrochem. Soc.

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The objective of this work is to establish the design principles for a proton exchange membrane fuel cell in automotive applications. In this work, the macro-scale analysis was considered to create the overall design principle. A combination of experiments and numerical simulations were carried out and the results analyzed to enhance understanding of the behavior of the large-scale 300-cm 2 proton exchange membrane fuel cell under automotive operations. A three-dimensional computational fluid dynamicsbased methodology was used to predict such as the current and temperature distributions of this design as a function of anode relative humidity. The effect of flow direction and the cooling pattern on this design was also taken into account to enhance the understanding for this selected flow-field design. The predictions show that the gas flow and cooling directions are important dependent variables that can impact the overall performance and local distributions. As the increased number of power generators utilizing fossil fuel energy increases in many applications, the necessity for alternatives to the internal-combustion engine become even more obvious. Automakers and industrial developers are investigating many ways to significantly reduce emissions for stationary and transportation applications, Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells (PEMFCs) are now widely seen as a possibility. Distributions in reactant species concentration in a PEMFC cause distributions in local current density, temperature and water over the area of a PEMFC. These can lead to locally negative effects such as excessive hydration or dehydration in the PEMFC thus causing stresses in effective regions of the fuel cell. Changing operating conditions and design parameters including their properties inside PEMFC system such as flow field configurations, gas diffusion layer (GDL), and membrane electrode assembly (MEA) could vary uniformity in distribution and impact the fuel cell performance and durability. [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16] The inherent non-linearity of the equations governing PEMFC performance on a three-dimensional level requires iterative solution techniques. Solving a full three-dimensional CFD model for the flow channel and diffusion layers of a PEMFC shows important interactions of porous media and flow-field design that affect distributions of current, temperature, and species transport as discussed in numerous literature for the past ten years. This type of model lends itself well to investigating the physics inside full-scale PEMFCs. 1,2,6,10,23,24 In this work, three-dimensional (3D) CFD simulations of PEMFC were performed for a full size single cell with 300 cm 2 active area. An ultimate purpose of this study was to establish a model-based engineering capability to design the PEMFC for targeted applications. For this time, robustness of the fuel cell performance was investigated with various operating conditions which can impact the water management problems in the PEMFC. 25,26 Especially, relative hu...

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Section: Model Developmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Macro-Scale Analysis of Large Scale PEM Fuel Cell Flow-Fields for Automotive Applications

Shimpalee

Hirano

DeBolt

et al. 2017

J. Electrochem. Soc.

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“…In the research of improvement of the PEM fuel cell performance, a number of experiment and numerical efforts have been devoted for it especially for water management inside the PEM fuel cells for steady state and transient condition as reported in [8][9][10]. However, their flow-field effect in the performance is absent from literature.…”

Section: Simulation Modelsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of Straight and Serpentine Flow Field Designs on Temperature Distribution in Proton Exchange Membrane (PEM) Fuel Cell

et al. 2016

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Abstract. Proton exchange membrane fuel cells or sometimes called as polymer electrolyte membrane (PEM) fuel cells is a device for energy transformation in a changing process from one form of energy to another form of energy. It became as an alternative especially for future use in stationary and vehicular applications. PEM fuel cells provide high efficiency and power density with null emission, low operating temperature, quickly start and long life. One of the aspects that are crucial in optimizing the PEM fuel cells performance is a flow field geometry. In this paper, a simulation case of PEM fuel cells was simulated to determine effects of a straight and serpentine flow field on temperature distribution in PEM fuel cells. ANSYS Fluent software was used to simulate 3-dimensional models of single PEM fuel cells in order to determine the effects of changes in the geometry flow field on temperature distributions. Results showed that the serpentine flow field design produces a better temperature distribution along the membrane. The simulation result shows a good agreement with the experiment, thus boost a higher confidence in the results to determine the effectiveness of the flow field design in PEM fuel cells.

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“…Using experimental studies and numerical simulations, researchers have investigated flow-field designs to enhance the current density, the homogeneity of the reactants, and the uniformity of temperature and to overcome pressure losses and the removal of water from the cathode side [7][8][9][10][11]. Water flooding in the GDL under ribs is usually more serious than elsewhere at the cathode [12].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Recently, studies have focused on the effect of the geometrical configuration of a gas channel on the mass, current, and heat transfer in PEFCs [9,[16][17][18][19]. Akhtar et al [16] investigated the effect of the channel width and rib-width ratio on the cathode transport phenomena of a proton-exchange membrane fuel cell and found that increasing the channel-to-width ratio had no effect on the total liquid saturation; however, this value was significantly affected under the channel and rib regions of porous layers.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Numerical Investigation of Cross Flow on the Performance of Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cell

Uddin

Oshima

2013

JTST

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A three dimensional, single-phase, isothermal study of a polymer electrolyte fuel cell (PEFC) was conducted to investigate the mechanism of convective flow effect on the performance of fuel cell. Convective flow was caused by inlet velocity and cross flow through the GDL. To clarify the mechanism of cross flow effect on the performance of PEFC, it was induced in the parallel flow field, whereas cross flow inherently appear in the serpentine flow fields. In addition, to isolate the contribution of cross flow on the performance, the simulation was executed with a low current density where oxygen transport resistance was stronger than proton/electron transport resistance. Gas channels with a smaller pitch length produced a more uniform current density than those with a larger pitch length. With increase of inlet velocity the performance increases for any values of pitch length. Cross flow through the GDL caused by the differential pressure between adjacent channels had significantly enhanced the local current density of a PEFC and simultaneously increased the degree of non-uniformity in the current density. The cross flow can increase the performance of fuel cell by reducing the oxygen transport resistance. Therefore, it is possible to overcome the oxygen transport limitation by inducing cross flow.

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The effect of serpentine flow-field designs on PEM fuel cell performance

Cited by 211 publications

References 15 publications

Macro-Scale Analysis of Large Scale PEM Fuel Cell Flow-Fields for Automotive Applications

Macro-Scale Analysis of Large Scale PEM Fuel Cell Flow-Fields for Automotive Applications

Effects of Straight and Serpentine Flow Field Designs on Temperature Distribution in Proton Exchange Membrane (PEM) Fuel Cell

Numerical Investigation of Cross Flow on the Performance of Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cell

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