Non-uniform design of proton exchange membrane fuel cell and its matching with operations

Improving the uniformity of internal multiphysics is a critical issue for proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFC). To overcome the non-uniformity of the pressure, reactant, and water in PEMFC operation and improve the performance, a non-uniform structural design is proposed for PEMFC. The gradient distribution of channel width and the porosity in porous electrode components (gas diffusion layer, microporous layer, and catalyst layer) are studied in the present research. Among them, the integrated decreasing design of the cathode with 0.3 mm channel width gradient and 0.1 porous electrode porosity gradient contributes 2.77% to the performance improvement. A joint operation model integrated with the particle swarm optimization algorithm was constructed to implement the matching of operating parameters with the non-uniform structure design. The maximum average power density could be realized with operation pressure 250000Pa, operation temperature 333K, anode relative humidity 85.60%, cathode relative humidity 50%, anode stoichiometric ratio 1.92, and cathode stoichiometric ratio 3.