• Journal of Energy Engineering
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.1-9
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• 2020

In recent days, fuel cell has received attention from the world as an alternative power source to hydrocarbon used in automobile engines. With the industrial advances of fuel cell, There have been a lot of researches actively conducted to find a way of generating hydrogen. Among many hydrogen production methods, Solid Oxide Electrolysis Cell(SOEC) is not only a basic way but also environment-friendly method to produce hydrogen gas. Solid Oxide Electrolysis Cell has lower electrical energy demands and high thermal efficiency since it is possible to operate under high temperature and high pressure conditions. For these reasons, experimental researches as well as studies on numerical modeling for Solid Oxide Electrolysis Cell have been under way. However, studies on numerical modeling are relatively less enough than experimental accomplishments and have limited performance prediction, which mostly is considered as a result from inadequate effects of electrochemical properties by temperature and pressure. In this study, various experimental studies of commercial Membrane Electrode Assembly (MEA) composed of Ni-YSZ (40wt%, Ni-60 wt% YSZ)/8-YSZ (TOSOH, TZ8Y)/LSM (La_0.9Sr_0.1MnO₃) was utilized for improving effectiveness of SOEC model. After numerically analyzing effects of electrochemical properties according to operating temperature, causing the largest deviation between experiments and simulation are that Charge Transfer Coefficient (CTC), exchange current density, diffusion coefficient, electrical conductivity in SOEC. Analyzing temperature effect on parameter used in overpotential model is conducted for modeling of SOEC. cross-validation method is adopted for application of various MEA and evaluating feasibility of model. As a result, the study confirm that the numerical model of SOEC based on structured process of effectiveness evaluation makes performance prediction better.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2006.11a
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• pp.352-355
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• 2006

As the stainless steel has good corrosion resistance, mechanical property and ease of manufacture, it has been studied as the candidate material of metallic bipolar plate for automotive PIMFC. But, metal is dissolved under fuel cell operating conditions Dissolved ions contaminate a membrane electrode assembly (MEA) and, decrease the fuel cell performance. In addition, metal oxide formation on the surface of stainless steel increases the contact resistance in the fuel cell. These problems have been acted as an obstacle in the application of stainless steel to bipolar plate. Therefore, many kinds of coating technologies have been examined in order to solve these problems. In this study, stainless steel was coated in order to achieve high conductivity and corrosion resistance by several methods. Contact resistance was measured by using a tensile tester and impedance analyzer Corrosion characteristics of coated stainless steel were examined by Tafel-extrapolation method from the polarization curves in a solution simulating the anodic and cathodic environment of PEMFC. Fuel cell performance was also evaluated by single cell test. We tested various coated metal bipolar plate and conventional and graphite were also tested as comparative samples. In the result, coated stainless steel bipolar plate exhibited better cell performance than graphite to bipolar plate.

• Journal of Hydrogen and New Energy
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.300-308
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• 2009

In a pursuit of the development of alternative mobile power sources with a high energy density, a planar and air-breathing PEMFCs with a new type of hydrogen cartridge which uses onsite $H_2$ generated from sodium borohydride ($NaBH_4$) hydrolysis have been investigated for use in advanced power systems. Two types of $H_2$ generation through $NaBH_4$ hydrolysis are available: (1) using organic acids such as sulphuric acid, malic acid, and sodium hydrogen carbonate in aqueous solution with solid $NaBH_4$ and (2) using solid selected catalysts such as Pt, Ru, CoB into the stabilized alkaline $NaBH_4$ solution. It might therefore be relevant at this stage to evaluate the relative competitiveness of the two methods mentioned above. The effects of flow rate of stabilized $NaBH_4$ solution, MEA (Membrane Electrode Assembly) improvement, and type and flow control of the catalytic acidic solution have been studied and the cell performances of the planar, air-breathing PEMFCs using $NaBH_4$ has been measured from aspects of power density, fuel efficiency, energy density, and fast response of cell. In our experiments, planar, air-breathing PEMFCs using $NaBH_4$ achieved to maximum power density of 128mW/$cm^2$ at 0.7V and energy efficiency of 46% and has many advantages such as low operating temperature, sustained operation at a high power density, compactness, the potential for low cost and volume, long stack life, fast star-up and suitability for discontinuous operation.

• Journal of Hydrogen and New Energy
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.35-45
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• 2003

Polymer electrolyte fuel cells(PEFC) have been considered to be a suitable candidate for residential, portable and mobile applications, due to their high efficiency and power density, even at low operating temperature. KIER developed a 5kW class PEFC system for residential application and operated the system for over 1,000 hours. To develop a 5kW PEFC system, performance of a cell was improved through successive tests of single cell of small and large area. Fabrication of three 2,5 kW class stacks, design and fabrication of natural gas reformer, design of auxiliary equipments such as DC/DC converter, DC/AC inverter and humidifying units were carried out along with integration of components, operation and evaluation of total system. During the development period from 1999 to 2001, MEA(membrane electrode assembly) fabrication technologies, design and fabrication technologies for separators, stacking technologies and so on were developed, thereby providing basis for developing stacks of higher efficiency and power density in the future. Experience of development of natural gas reformer opened possibilities to use various kinds of fuels. Main results obtained from the development of a 5kW class PEFC system for residential application are summarized.

• Journal of Hydrogen and New Energy
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• v.35 no.4
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• pp.392-400
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• 2024

In this study, 3-cell stack fuel cell power technology was developed for charging superconducting coil. It was found that the performance of the fuel cell stack increased depending on the number of activation. In addition, the flow rates of hydrogen and air supplied to 3-cell stack was adjusted because of a large difference in membrane electrode assembly (MEA) characteristics depending on its location. As a result, it was confirmed that it was possible to apply current to the superconducting coil from about 15 to 33 A by changing the variable resistance, and it was confirmed that the voltage difference between fuel cell cells could be overcome through sufficient control of fuel supply.

• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.47 no.3
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• pp.362-367
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• 2009

Recently, the use of formic acid as a fuel for direct liquid fuel cells has emerged as a promising alternative to methanol. In the work presented herein, we evaluated direct formic acid fuel cells(DFAFCs) with various components under operating conditions, for example, the thickness of the proton exchange membrane, concentration of formic acid, gas diffusion layer, and commercial catalyst. The thickness of the proton exchange membrane influenced performance related to the fuel cross-over. To optimize the cell performance, we investigated on the proper concentration of formic acid and catalyst for the formic acid oxidation. Consequently, membrance-electrode assembly(MEA) consisted of $Nafion^{(R)}$-115 and the Pt-Ru black as a anode catalyst showed the maximum performance. This performance was superior to the DMFCs' one.

• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.32 no.6
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• pp.613-620
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• 2021

A flow channel shape of PEMFC has an influence on the internal flow uniformity. If the reactant distribution in a flow path is not uniform during operation, both catalyst deactivation and mechanical damage of membrane could occur resulting in decreasing the membrane electrode assembly (MEA) durability. Numerous studies concerning flow design have been conducted to make smooth supply and uniform distribution of reactants in fuel cells. The baffle of flow path could improve fuel cell performance through the forced convection effect. A sub-channel, as an additional air flow path, could increase the reactant concentration and reduce the mass transfer loss via a smooth water discharge. In this study, computational fluid dynamics (CFD) was used to analyze the effect of blocks and sub-channels on the current density and oxygen concentration of the fuel cell. As a result, the limit current density and oxygen concentration at a rear block increased when using blocks and sub-channels in a flow channel. In particular, the current density increased significantly when the sub-channel was placed between two blocks. Also, the sub-channel position was optimized by analyzing the oxygen concentration, and the oxygen concentration was recovered at a rear block in the fuel cell.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.8 no.2 s.23
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• pp.15-27
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• 2004

The purpose of this paper is to improve the performance of Polymer electrolyte fuel cell(PEMFC) by studying the channel dimension of bipolar plates using commercial CFD program 'Fluent'. Simulations are done ranging from 0.5 to 3.0mm for different size in order to find the channel size which shoves the highst hydrogen consumption. The results showed that the smaller channel width, land width, channel depth, the higher hydrogen consumption in anode. When channel width is increased, the pressure drop in channel is decreased because total channel length Is decreased, and when land width is increased, the net hydrogen consumption is decreased because hydrogen is diffused under the land width. It is also found that the influence of hydrogen consumption is larger at different channel width than it at different land width. The change of hydrogen consumption with different channel depth isn't as large as it with different channel width, but channel depth has to be small as can as it does because it has influence on the volume of bipolar plates. however the hydrogen utilization among the channel sizes more than 1.0mm which can be machined in reality is the most at channel width 1.0, land width 1.0, channel depth 0.5mm and considered as optimum channel size. The fuel cell combined with 2cm${\times}$2cm diagonal or serpentine type flow field and MEA(Membrane Electrode Assembly) is tested using 100W PEMFC test station to confirm that the channel size studied in simulation. The results showed that diagonal and serpentine flow field have similarly high OCV and current density of diagonal (low field is higher($2-40mA/m^2$) than that of serpentine flow field under 0.6 voltage, but the current density of serpentine type has higher performance($5-10mA/m^2$) than that of diagonal flow field under 0.7-0.8 voltage.