Abstract
Polymer electrolyte fuel cell stacks, in the commonly used bipolar arrangement, consist of multiple stacked single cells in a filter-press-type arrangement. The bipolar arrangement connects the cells in series electrically and in parallel for the reactant and coolant flows; therefore, all cells have to carry the same current but they can receive different reactant mass flows. The reactant and the coolant supply may be different owing to statistically varying percolation resistances of the fluids and owing to the position of the cells in the stack. Therefore, the commonly made assumption that individual cells perform equally is valid neither for normal operation nor for the degradation of individual cells. Differences between cells can be of systematic or stochastic nature and translate into differences in the degradation rate under operation or start/stop conditions. The four main cases are discussed.
Keywords
- Fuel Cell
- Cell Voltage
- Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell
- Membrane Electrode Assembly
- Current Density Distribution
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Blair, J.D., and Dircks, K. (1992) Method and apparatus for monitoring fuel cell performance, US Patent 5,170,124
Bradean, R., Haas, H., Eggen, K., Richards, C., and Vrba, T. (2006) Stack Models and Designs for Improving Fuel Cell Startup from Freezing Temperatures, ECS Transactions, 3, 1159–1168
Chang, P.A.C., St-Pierre, J., Stumper, J., and Wetton, B. (2006) Flow distribution in proton exchange membrane fuel cell stacks, J. Power Sources, 162, 340–355
Freunberger, S.A., SchneIDer, I.A., Sui, P.-C., Wokaun, A., Djilali, N., and Büchi, F.N. (2007) Cell Interaction Phenomena in Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cell Stacks, J. Electrochem. Soc., submitted
Heinzel, A., Nolte, R., Ledjeff-Hey, K., and Zedda, M. (1998) Membrane fuel cells – concepts and system design, Electrochim. Acta, 43, 3817–3820 http://www.angstrompower.com
Jiang, R., and Chu, D. (2001) Stack design and performance of polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells, J. Power Sources, 93, 25–31
Kim, G.S., St-Pierre, J., Promislow, K., and Wetton, B. (2005) Electrical coupling in proton exchange membrane fuel cell stacks, J. Power Sources, 152, 210–217
Kulikovsky, A.A. (2006) Electrostatic broadening of current-free spots in a fuel cell stack: The mechanism of stack aging?, Electrochem. Comm., 8, 1225–1228
Lacy, R.A. (2001) Measuring cell voltages of a fuel cell stack, US Patent 6,313,750
Owejan, J.P., Trabold, T.A., Gagliardo, J.J., Jacobson, D.L., Carter, R.N., Hussey, D.S., and Arif, M. (2007a) Voltage instability in a simulated fuel cell stack correlated to cathode water accumulation, J. Power Sources, 171, 626–633
Owejan, J.P., Trabold, T.A., Jacobson, D.L., Arif, M., and Kandlikar, S.G. (2007b) Effects of flow field and diffusion layer properties on water accumulation in a PEM fuel cell, Int. J. Hydrogen Energy, 32, 4489–4502
Pekula, N., Heller, K., Chuang, P.A., Turhan, A., Mench, M.M., Brenizer, J.S., and Unlu, K. (2005) Study of water distribution and transport in a polymer electrolyte fuel cell using neutron imaging, Nucl. Instrum. Methods Phys. Res. Sect. A: Accelerators Spectrometers Detectors Associated Equipment, 542, 134–141
Promislow, K., and Wetton, B. (2005) A simple, mathematical model of thermal coupling in fuel cell stacks, J. Power Sources, 150, 129–135
Reiser, C. (2004) Battery-boosted, rapID startup of frozen fuel cell United States Patent 6,777,115
Reiser, C.A., Bregoli, L., Patterson, T.W., Yi, J.S., Yang, J.D., Perry, M., L., and Jarvi, T.D., A Reverse-Current Decay Mechanism for Fuel Cells, J. Electrochem. SolID-State Lett., 8, A273–A276, (2005)
Santis, M., Freunberger, S.A., Papra, M., Wokaun, A., and Büchi, F.N. (2006) Experimental investigation of coupling phenomena in polymer electrolyte fuel cell stacks, J. Power Sources, 161, 1076–1083
Wang, G., Ramani, M., and EldrID, S. (2006) Plate In-Plane Electrical Resistance Impact to Stack Performance, ECS Transactions, 3, 1049–1056
Webb, D., and Moller-Holst, S. (2001) Measuring indivIDual cell voltages in fuel cell stacks, J. Power Sources, 103, 54–60
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2009 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Büchi, F.N. (2009). Heterogeneous Cell Ageing in Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cell Stacks. In: Büchi, F.N., Inaba, M., Schmidt, T.J. (eds) Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cell Durability. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-85536-3_22
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-85536-3_22
Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY
Print ISBN: 978-0-387-85534-9
Online ISBN: 978-0-387-85536-3
eBook Packages: Chemistry and Materials ScienceChemistry and Material Science (R0)