EXTENDED ABSTRACT

Paper Title:
EVALUATION OF SUB-RIB CONVECTION IN PEM FUEL CELL FLOW
FIELDS WITH DIFFERENT GEOMETRICAL CHARACTERISTICS

No. Author Position University Address E-mail

Ovidius University Mamaia
of Constanta Boulevard no.
1
Viorel lecturer 124,
Ionescu1,2 Constanta v_ionescu@univ-ovidius.ro
2 2
student Doctoral School of Mircea cel
1.
Mechanical Batran Street
Engineering and no. 104,
Mechatronics, Constanta
Maritime University
of Constanta

Introduction /
Purpose of the paper
Theoretical background /
Research problem
The sub-rib convection of reactant gases and pressure drop along the gas
channel, which are affecting the oxygen supply at the catalyst electrode
active area and the electrochemical reaction rate at cathode, are influenced
by some geometrical flow field factors like channel/rib width and channel
cross sectional area. In this study, the overall under-rib convection along
the entire active area is quantified for seven single serpentine two
channels flow field models, differing by their geometrical dimensions:
channel width a(mm), height b(mm), length L(mm) and distance between
channels: rib width w(mm).
Polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) are considered one
of the best technologies used in order to resolve the problems related to
energy depletion and environmental pollution, due to their high efficiency
and low exhaust emission, producing only water as by-product.
Bipolar plate flow field serves an important role in evenly distributing
reactants over the entire catalyst layer (CL) of PEMFC, which results in
uniform current distributions, large discharging current and high power
density. The most qualitative flow field for PEMFC applications proved to
be the serpentine flow field, having a higher pressure drop than parallel
flow field and efficiently removing accumulated water from the channels.
Because the flow typically proceeds along the serpentine channel at
significant velocity, pressure differences can develop between adjacent
channels due to viscous losses, forcing the fluid to short-circuit from one
channel to the next through the porous gas diffusion layer (GDL) under the
lands (ribs) of the bipolar plate.This convective-type transport mechanism
is known in literature under the name of channel bypass or sub-rib (under-
rib) convection.

Please submit your extended abstract according to the instructions found in section Submission on
http://inter-eng.upm.ro/.
 In this paper, a channel bypass convection model considered from
literature was used to evaluate the relative importance of convection versus
diffusion for the present numerical models in terms of Peclet number and
percent degree of sub-rib convective flow at serpentine boundary.
Approach / The Finite Element Method(FEM) based Comsol Multiphysics software
Research methodology (vers. 5.2) is used here for numerically computing the convective type
velocity field distribution along GDL and local current density distribution
at oxygen reaction site boundary for all the models investigated. Pressure
drop along the channel length, oxygen molar concentration and oxygen
diffusive flux at the cathode boundary is also evaluated numerically.

Model M4 with the lowest channel rib value(w = 0.75 mm) presented a
quite uniform GDL velocity distribution along the area between channels
and the highest percentage of sub-rib convection at inner boundaries of
serpentine, but overall by-pass convection between the channels(evaluated
with the Peclet number) was quite low. For this model was registered the
lowest rate of oxygen consumption at cathode and a local current density
distribution at constant high values only on approximately half of the
Results / reaction site active area.
Main findings Model M5 with geometrical channel dimensions a = b = 1 mm, w = 1.25
mm and L = 40 mm presented a medium convective flow through GDL
layer in the serpentine area (8%), a second highest sub-rib convection
degree along the entire GDL area between the two channels, a high
pressure drop along gas admission channel(55 Pa), the best consumption of
oxygen near the central part of cathode boundary (molar concentration of
2.1 2.2 mol/m3) and the most uniform local current distribution along the
entire cathode active area considered, at values of 1.1 1.17 A/cm2.
With the help of Comsol Multiphysics software it was established a
correlation between the calculated sub-rib convection flow degrees of
Contributions / oxygen( in the GDL area between the two channels and at GDL inner
Original aspects serpentine boundary) and the numerically computed local current density
distribution, pressure drop along gas admission channel and oxygen molar
concentration at cathode boundary for all the models investigated.

Energy Efficiency Technologies

Link with the conference Power and energy systems
theme
Renewable energy management and technologies

Fuel cell, convective flux, molar concentration, local current density,

Key words (5) cathode boundary.

Please submit your extended abstract according to the instructions found in section Submission on
http://inter-eng.upm.ro/.