IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/renene/v30y2005i10p1557-1572.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The effects of porosity distribution variation on PEM fuel cell performance

Author

Listed:
  • Roshandel, R.
  • Farhanieh, B.
  • Saievar-Iranizad, E.

Abstract

Gas diffusion layers (GDL) are one of the important parts of the PEM fuel cell as they serve to transport the reactant gases to the catalyst layer. Porosity of this layer has a large effect on the PEM fuel cell performance. The spatial variation in porosity arises due to two effects: (1) compression of the electrode on the solid landing areas and (2) water produced at the cathode side of gas diffusion layers. Both of these factors change the porosity of gas diffusion layers and affect the fuel cell performance. To implement this performance analysis, a mathematical model which considers oxygen and hydrogen mass fraction in gas diffusion layer and the electrical current density in the catalyst layer, and the fuel cell potentials are investigated. The porosity variation in the GDL is calculated by considering the applied pressure and the amount of the water generated in the cell. The validity of the model is approved by comparing the computed results with experimental data. The obtained results show that the decrease in the average porosity causes the reduction in oxygen consumption, so that a lower electrical current density is generated. It is also shown that when the electrical current density is low, the porosity variation in gas diffusion layer has no significant influence on the level of polarization whereas at higher current density the influence is very significant. The porosity variation causes non-uniformity in the mass transport which in turn reduces the current density and a lower fuel cell performance is obtained.

Suggested Citation

  • Roshandel, R. & Farhanieh, B. & Saievar-Iranizad, E., 2005. "The effects of porosity distribution variation on PEM fuel cell performance," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 30(10), pages 1557-1572.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:renene:v:30:y:2005:i:10:p:1557-1572
    DOI: 10.1016/j.renene.2004.11.017
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0960148104004574
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.renene.2004.11.017?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Rakhshanpouri, S. & Rowshanzamir, S., 2013. "Water transport through a PEM (proton exchange membrane) fuel cell in a seven-layer model," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 220-231.
    2. Guo, Lingyi & Chen, Li & Zhang, Ruiyuan & Peng, Ming & Tao, Wen-Quan, 2022. "Pore-scale simulation of two-phase flow and oxygen reactive transport in gas diffusion layer of proton exchange membrane fuel cells: Effects of nonuniform wettability and porosity," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 253(C).
    3. Najjari, Mustapha & Khemili, Faycel & Ben Nasrallah, Sassi, 2008. "The effects of the cathode flooding on the transient responses of a PEM fuel cell," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 33(8), pages 1824-1831.
    4. Kong, Im Mo & Jung, Aeri & Kim, Young Sang & Kim, Min Soo, 2017. "Numerical investigation on double gas diffusion backing layer functionalized on water removal in a proton exchange membrane fuel cell," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 478-487.
    5. Inamuddin, & Cheema, Taqi Ahmad & Zaidi, S.M.J. & Rahman, S.U., 2011. "Three dimensional numerical investigations for the effects of gas diffusion layer on PEM fuel cell performance," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 36(2), pages 529-535.
    6. Xing, Lei & Shi, Weidong & Su, Huaneng & Xu, Qian & Das, Prodip K. & Mao, Baodong & Scott, Keith, 2019. "Membrane electrode assemblies for PEM fuel cells: A review of functional graded design and optimization," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 177(C), pages 445-464.
    7. Lee, Yongtaek & Kim, Bosung & Kim, Yongchan & Li, Xianguo, 2011. "Degradation of gas diffusion layers through repetitive freezing," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 88(12), pages 5111-5119.
    8. Zikhona Nondudule & Jessica Chamier & Mahabubur Chowdhury, 2021. "Effect of Stratification of Cathode Catalyst Layers on Durability of Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(10), pages 1-17, May.
    9. Kong, Im Mo & Choi, Jong Won & Kim, Sung Il & Lee, Eun Sook & Kim, Min Soo, 2015. "Experimental study on the self-humidification effect in proton exchange membrane fuel cells containing double gas diffusion backing layer," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 145(C), pages 345-353.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:renene:v:30:y:2005:i:10:p:1557-1572. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.journals.elsevier.com/renewable-energy .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.