• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2006.06a
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• pp.99-102
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• 2006

Optimal flow-field design of bipolar-plates for a commercial class PEM(polymer electrolyte membrane) fuel cell stack was carried out on the basis of three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics(CFD) simulation. A three-dimensional CFD model originally developed by Shimpalee et al., has been utilized for performing large-scale simulation of a single fuel cell consisting of bipolar-plates gas diffusion layers, and a membrane-electrode-assembly(MEA). The CFD model is able to predict the current density, pressure drops, gas velocities, vapor and liquid water contents, temperature distributions, etc. inside a single fuel cell. Depending on simulation results from the CFD modeling of a PEM fuel cell, several flow-fields of bipolar-plates were designed and verified. The final design of the bipolar-plate has been chosen from the simulations and experimental tests and showed the best performance as expected from the simulation results under a normal operating condition. Thus, the CFD simulation approach to design the optimal flow-field of the bipolar-plates was successful. The final design was adopted as the best flow-field to build a commercial scale PEM fuel cell stack, the performance of which shows about 42% higher than that of the older bipolar-plate design.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2008.05a
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• pp.554-557
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• 2008

In this study, two types of central flow distributor designs are presented and compared to obtain the optimal compact design which has the least flow resistance and the uniform flow distribution in a vehicular fuel cell stack. For effective and reliable prediction on the thermo-flow characteristics of the reactants flow over the entire fuel cell stack domain, open channel flow in the bipolar plates of the power generating cells were simulated by applying a simplified flow resistance model with an empirical porous concept. A number of case studies were performed to figure out an optimal configuration of a central flow distributor device in terms of the time-dependent thermo-flow behavior and load-dependent flow distribution. The results showed that the stable and load-independent thermo-flow uniformity is very design specific, which is closely associated with the design of central manifolding devices in order to achieve the enhanced volumetric power density and the reliable long-lasting operating of fuel cells.

• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.26-34
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• 2008

This study presents an aerodynamic design and an experimental performance test of a turbo air compressor consisted of mixed-flow impeller and curved diffuser for the PEM fuel cell vehicle application. Many studies compare the efficiency, cost or noise level of high-pressure and low-pressure operation of PEM fuel cell systems. Pressure ratio 2.2:1 is considered as design target The goal of compressor design is to enlarge the flow margin of compressor from surge to choke mass flow rate to cover the operational envelope of FCV. Large-scale rig test is performed to evaluate the compressor performance and to compare the effects of compressor exit pipe volume to stall or surge characteristics. The results show that the mixed-flow compressor designed has large flow margin, and the flow margin of compressor configuration with small exit volume is larger than that with large exit volume.

• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.32 no.4
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• pp.245-255
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• 2021

Various studies about metallic bipolar plates have been conducted to improve fuel cell performance through flow field design optimization. These research works have been mainly focused on fuel cells for vehicle, but not fuel cells for building. In order to reduce the price and volume of fuel cell stacks for building, it is necessary to apply a metallic flow field, In this study, for a metallic flow field applied to a fuel cell for building, the effect of a change in the flow field shape on the performance of a polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cell was confirmed using a model and experiments with a down-sizing single cell. As a result, the flow field using a metal foam outperforms the channel type flow field because it has higher internal differential pressure and higher reactants velocity in gas diffusion layer, resulting in higher water removal and higher oxygen concentration in the catalyst layer than the channel type flow field. This study is expected to contribute to providing basic data for selecting the optimal flow field for the full stack of polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells for buildings.

• The KSFM Journal of Fluid Machinery
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• v.15 no.5
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• pp.11-19
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• 2012

The main function of fuel cell manifold is to render reactants distribution as uniform as possible into a fuel cell stack. The purpose of this study is to numerically investigate the effects of stack manifold design on reactants distribution within a fuel cell stack. Four manifold designs with different manifold entrance shapes (expansion or diffuser) and different values of the extra width between the cell outer channel and manifold side wall are considered and applied to the fuel cell stack consisting of 50 cells. Since the fuel cell stack geometry involves several millions of grid points for numerical calculations, a parallel computing methodology is employed to substantially reduce the computational time and overcome the memory requirement. The numerical simulations are carried out and calculated results clearly demonstrate that both the manifold entrance shape and extra width have a substantial influence on manifold performance, controlling the degree of flow separation and entrance length for fully developed flow in the manifold channel. Finally, we suggest the optimum design of fuel cell manifold based on the simulation results.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2004.04a
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• pp.2105-2110
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• 2004

Plate-fin type recuperators for the gas turbine/fuel cell hybrid power generating system were designed using commercial design software, MUSE. Heat transfer efficiency and total pressure drop in the recuperator were calculated to confirm required recuperator performance. Both counter flow and cross flow type plate-fin recuperators were designed. Results show that the counter flow type has higher efficiency and short core length, but the cross flow type is simpler to construct because the cross flow type does not need additional distributors. Two or three headers for the each recuperator core will be designed and tested to evaluate best header design. The designed recuperators and headers which will be designed later will be constructed, tested, and used in gas turbine/fuel cell hybrid power generating system.

• Journal of Electrochemical Science and Technology
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• v.5 no.3
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• pp.73-81
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• 2014

This paper describes the continuous flow operation of membraneless sodium perborate fuel cell using acid/alkaline bipolar electrolyte. Here, hydrazine is used as a fuel and sodium perborate is used as an oxidant under Alkaline-acid media configuration. Sodium perborate affords hydrogen peroxide in aqueous medium. In our operation, the laminar flow based microfluidic membranleless fuel cell achieved a maximum power density of $27.2mW\;cm^{-2}$ when using alkaline hydrazine as the anolyte and acidic perborate as the catholyte at room temperature with a fuel mixture flow rate of $0.3mL\;min^{-1}$. The simple planar structured membraneless sodium perborate fuel cell enables high design flexibility and easy integration of the microscale fuel cell into actual microfluidic systems and portable power applications.

• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.20 no.6
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• pp.492-498
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• 2009

Six sigma methode was applied for optimization of flow field design of a proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC). The optimization between number of channel and channel/rib width was suggested in this paper with six sigma method. With the help of six sigma design of experiment (DOE) the number of experiments may be reduced dramatically. The fuel cell channel design optimization with results of these experiments with a 100 $cm^2$ serpentine flow field indicates a optimization data for a given constant operating conditions.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Visualization
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.56-62
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• 2021

Solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs) is the high efficiency fuel cell operating at high temperatures ranging from 700-1000℃. Design of the flow paths of the fuel and air in SOFCs is important to improve cell performance and prevent cell degradation. However, the uneven distribution of current density in the traditional type having one inlet and outlet causes cell degradation. In this regard, the parallel flow path with two inlet and outlets was designed and compared to the traditional type based on computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation. To check the cell performance, hydrogen distribution, velocity distribution and current density distribution were monitored. The results validated that the parallel designs with two inlets and outlets have a higher cell performance compared to the traditional design with one inlet and outlet due to a larger reaction area. In case of uniform-type paths, more uniform current density distribution was observed with less cross-sectional variation in flow paths. In case of contracted and expanded inflow paths, significant improvement of performance and uniform current density was not observed compared to uniform parallel path. Considering SOFC cell with uniform current density can prevent cell degradation, more suitable design of SOFC cell with less cross-sectional variation in the flow path should be developed. This work can be helpful to understand the role of flow distribution in the SOFC performance.

• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.23 no.5
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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.