Ramped step flow field to enhance mass transfer capacity and performance for PEMFC

Ke Jiang, Taotao Zhao, Wenxuan Fan, Zhenning Liu and Guolong Lu

Renewable Energy, 2023, vol. 219, issue P2

Abstract: Proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFC) hold great promise for various energy-conversion technologies. Flow channel structure inside bipolar plate plays an important role in water transport, gas distribution and heat transfer for PEMFC. Herein, a novel design of ramped step structure has been proposed, in which the ramps are introduced into the front side of step structures to form a continuous and smooth flow field. The cell performance and improvement mechanism have been investigated by COMSOL. The results show that the net power density of PEMFC with ramped step flow field (RSFF) exhibits an increase of up to 17.55 %, 2.82 %, and 2.29 % when compared to conventional parallel flow field (CPFF), ramp flow field (RFF), and step flow field (SFF), respectively. RSFF can achieve higher and more uniform distribution of oxygen cross the entire gas diffusion layer and catalytic layer. Additionally, increasing the slope angle in RSFF will help to enhance the capacity of mass transfer within a certain range. Furthermore, RSFF improves water management by significantly increasing gas flow velocity at the end of the channel. This work paves the way for the design of tapering flow channels in PEMFC, opening up new avenues for research in this field.

Keywords: Proton exchange membrane fuel cell; Flow field; Ramped step; Channel structure; Gas distribution (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:renene:v:219:y:2023:i:p2:s0960148123014040

DOI: 10.1016/j.renene.2023.119489

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