• 한국자동차공학회논문집
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• 제16권2호
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• pp.93-98
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• 2008

To investigate the characteristics of water droplet on the gas diffusion layer from both top-view and side-view of the flow channel, a rig test apparatus was designed and fabricated with prism attached plate. This experimental device is used to simulate the growth of single liquid water droplet and its transport process with various air flow velocity and channel height. The contact angle hysteresis and height of water droplet are measured and analyzed. It is found that droplet tends towards to be instable by decreasing channel height, increasing flow velocity or making GDL more hydrophobic. Also, the simplified force balance model matches with experimental data only in a restricted range of operating conditions and shows discrepancy as the air flow velocity and channel height increases.

• 한국수소및신에너지학회논문집
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• 제23권5호
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• pp.476-483
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• 2012

Proper water management is crucial for the efficient operation of polymer electrolyte membrane (PEM) fuel cell. Especially, for automotive applications, A novel water management that can avoid both membrane dry-out and flooding is a very important task to achieve good performance and efficiency of PEM fuel cells. The aim of this study is to investigate the liquid water behavior on the gas diffusion layer (GDL) surface and in the cathode flow channel of a PEM unit fuel cell under flooding conditions. For this purpose, a transparent unit fuel cell is devised and fabricated by modifying the conventional PEM fuel cell design. The results of water droplet behavior under flooding conditions are mainly presented. The water distributions in the cathode flow channels with cell operating voltage are also compared and analyzed. Through this work, it is expected that the data obtained from this fundamental study can be effectively used to establish the basic water management strategy in terms of water removal from the flow channels in a PEM fuel cell stack.

• 디지털융복합연구
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• 제11권8호
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• pp.199-204
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• 2013

단순한 모델링이 아닌 3차원의 정밀한 모델링을 이용하여 연료전지 내부에서의 상황을 모사하였다. 자동차 엔진, 비행기 등의 설계에 있어서 실제 실험의 횟수를 줄여주기 위하여 매우 정밀한 전산유체역학(CFD)이 사용된다. 본 연구에서는 CD-ADAPCO사의 STAR-CD를 이용하여 고체고분자전해질형 연료전지(PEMFC)의 성능을 분석하였다. PEMFC 단위전지의 형상과 유로의 흐름의 변화에 따른 성능의 영향성을 분석하였다. 그 결과 rectangular cell 의 성능이 square cell 보다 높게 나타났으며 유체흐름의 방향은 성능에 큰 영향을 미치지 못했다. 또한 공기의 과잉률에 따른 전체적인 연료전지의 성능을 비교하였으며, 또한 PEMFC 내부에서의 전류밀도의 분포에 관한 분석을 실시하여 그 결과를 비교, 분석하였다. 그 결과 flip-flow의 경우가 co-flow의 경우에 비하여 최대치와 최고치의 값의 편차가 작은 것으로 확인되어 보다 균일한 분포를 가지는 것을 확인할 수 있었다.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 한국신재생에너지학회 2011년도 추계학술대회 초록집
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• pp.81.1-81.1
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• 2011

High temperature proton exchange membrane fuel cell (HT-PEMFC) has been regarded as a promising clean energy sources. In this study, a quasi-three-dimensional dynamic model of HT-PEMFC has been developed and the local dynamic characteristics are investigated. The model has the geometrical simplification of 2+1D reduction (quasi-3D). The one-dimensional model consists of nine control volumes in cross-sectional direction to solve the energy conservation and the species conservation equations. Then, the one-dimensional model is discretized into 25 local sections along the gas flow direction to account for gas and thermal transport in channels. With this discretization, the local characteristics of HT-PEMFC such as species conservation, temperature, and current density can be captured. In order to study the basic characteristics of HT-PEMFC, it is important to investigate the local dynamic characteristics. Thus, the model is simulated at various operating conditions and the local dynamic characteristics related to them are observed. The model is useful to investigate the distribution of HT-PEMFC characteristics and the physical phenomena in HT-PEMFC.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 한국신재생에너지학회 2010년도 추계학술대회 초록집
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• pp.76.2-76.2
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• 2010

The gas diffusion layer is the key component of the proton exchange membrane fuel cell because it directly affect to the mass transport mechanism and dynamic behavior of the cell. In this study, the effects of GDL aging on the transient response of the PEM fuel cell is systematically investigated using current step transient response analysis under different stoichiometric ratios and humidity conditions. With GDLs aged by the accelerated stress test, the effects of hydrophobicity and structural changes due to carbon loss in the GDL on the transient response of PEM fuel cells are determined. The degraded GDLs that had uneven hydrophobicity distributions cause local water flooding inside the GDL and induce lower and unstable voltage responses after load changes.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 한국신재생에너지학회 2009년도 추계학술대회 논문집
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• pp.132-132
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• 2009

To achieve the commercialization of PEM fuel cell, the durability problem must be solved. Recently, many researchers have focused on this durability problem and degradation studies about membrane and electrode have been reported. But durability characteristics of gas diffusion layer is not much reported yet. Durability of GDL is very important to maintain the performance of PEM fuel cell because the main function of GDL is a path of fuel and water and the GDL degradation causes the loss of the GDL function. In this study, the degradation of GDL, especially, the mechanical degradation process was investigated with the leaching test. The effect of water dissolution was observed through the test and the amount of GDL degradation was measured with various measurement methods such as weight measurement, static contact angle measurement, scanning electron microscope. After 2,000 hours test, the GDL showed structural damage and loss of hydrophobicity.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 한국신재생에너지학회 2011년도 추계학술대회 초록집
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• pp.81.2-81.2
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• 2011

The gas diffusion layer (GDL) consists of two main parts, the GDL backing layer, called as a substrate and the micro porous layer (MPL) coated on the GDBL. In this process, carbon particles of MPL penetrates to the GDBL consequently forms MPL penetration part. In this study, the micro porous layer (MPL) penetration thickness is determined as a design parameter of the GDL which affect pore size distribution profile through the GDL inducing different mass transfer characteristics. The pore size distribution and water permeability characteristics of the GDL are investigated and the cell performance is evaluated under fully/low humidification conditions. Transient response and voltage instability are also studied. In addition, to determine the effects of MPL penetration on the degradation, the carbon corrosion stress test is conducted. The GDL that have deep MPL penetration thickness shows better performance in high current density region because of enhanced water management, however, loss of penetrated MPL parts is shown after aging and it induces worse water management characteristics.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 한국신재생에너지학회 2006년도 추계학술대회
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• pp.485-488
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• 2006

고분자전해질형 연료전지(PEMFC)는 다른 연료전지에 비해 소형전원에서부터 분산용전원에 이르기 까지 넓은 응용범위를 가지고 있다. 이러한 PEMFC의 응용범위 중 메탄올 개질반응을 통하여 발생된 수소를 이용하는 휴대용 PEMFC 시스템의 경우, 개질 시 발생하는 일산화탄소가 백금촉매를 피독시켜 연료전지의 성능을 저하시키는 주요 원인이다. 따라서 연료전지의 성능저하를 막기 위해서는 개질가스의 일산화탄소의 농도를 10ppm이하로 낮추는 것이 요구된다. 본 연구에서는 이러한 개질가스의 일산화탄소 농도를 낮추기 위한 반응기를 설계 및 제작하였으며, 상용촉매를 사용하여 CO저감 성능실험을 하였다. 또한, PROX 촉매 및 methanation 촉매를 조합하여 사용함으로써 $140^{\circ}C{\sim}190^{\circ}C$ (약 $50^{\circ}C$)의 온도범위에서 일산화탄소의 농도 10ppm이하의 결과를 나타내었다.

• 한국수소및신에너지학회논문집
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• 제29권5호
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• pp.442-449
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• 2018

Research on High temperature polymer electrolyte fuel cell (HT-PEMFC) has actively been conducted all over the world. Since the HT-PEMFC can be operated at a high temperature of $120-180^{\circ}C$ using phosphoric acid-doped polybenzimidazole (PBI) electrolyte membrane, it has considerable advantages over conventional PEMFC in terms of operating conditions and system efficiency. However, If the thermal distribution is not uniform in the stack unit, degradation due to local reaction and deterioration of lifetime are difficult to prevent. The thin plate separator reduces the volume of the fuel cell stack and improves heat transfer, consequently, enhancing the cooling effect. In this paper, a large area flow field of thin plate separator for HT-PEMFC is designed and sub-stack is fabricated. We have studied stack performance evaluation under various operating conditions and it has been verified that the proposed design can achieve acceptable stack performance at a wide operating range.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 한국신재생에너지학회 2005년도 춘계학술대회
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• pp.326-329
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• 2005

Proton exchange membrane (PEM) should be sufficiently hydrated with proper water management to maintain a good ionic conductivity and performance of a PEM fuel cell. However. cathode flooding resulting from excess water can impede the transport of reactants and hence deteriorate the fuel cell performance. For the PEM fuel cell to be commercially viable as vehicle or portable applications, the flooding on the cathode side should be minimized during the fuel cell operation. In this study, visualization technique was applied to understand the cathode flooding phenomena on the cathode side of a PEM fuel cell. To this end. a transparent PEM unit fuel cell wi th an act ive area of $25cm^2$ was designed and manufactured to allow for the visualization of cathode channel with performance characteristics. Two-phase flow resulting from the electro-chemical reaction of fuel cell was investigated experimentally. The images photographed by CCD camera with cell operating temperatures $(30\~50^{\circ}C)$ were presented. Results indicated that the flooding on the cathode side first occurs near the exit of cathode channel. As the operating temperature of fuel cell increases. it was found that liquid water droplets tend to evaporate easily and it can have an influence on lowering the flooding level. It is expected that this study can effectively contribute to the detailed researches on modeling water transport of an operating PEM fuel cell including two-phase flow phenomena.