Facilitation of water management in low Pt loaded PEM fuel cell by creating hydrophobic microporous layer with PTFE, FEP and PDMS polymers: Effect of polymer and carbon amounts

ÖZTÜRK A., FIÇICILAR B., Eroglu I., BAYRAKÇEKEN YURTCAN A.

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HYDROGEN ENERGY, vol.42, no.33, pp.21226-21249, 2017 (SCI-Expanded) identifier identifier

  • Publication Type: Article / Article
  • Volume: 42 Issue: 33
  • Publication Date: 2017
  • Doi Number: 10.1016/j.ijhydene.2017.06.202
  • Journal Name: INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HYDROGEN ENERGY
  • Journal Indexes: Science Citation Index Expanded (SCI-EXPANDED), Scopus
  • Page Numbers: pp.21226-21249
  • Keywords: Polydimethylsiloxane, Hydrophobic material, Microporous layer, Water management, PEM fuel cell, GAS-DIFFUSION LAYER, MICRO-POROUS LAYER, ULTRA-LOW, CATALYST LAYER, SUPERHYDROPHOBIC SURFACE, HUMIDITY CONDITIONS, RELATIVE-HUMIDITY, CATHODE CATALYST, MOLECULAR-WEIGHT, MEMBRANE
  • Middle East Technical University Affiliated: No

Abstract

Microporous layers (MPLs) were prepared with different hydrophobic polymers to establish water management in polymer electrolyte membrane (PEM) fuel cells. Besides conventionally used polymers polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) and fluorinated ethylene propylene (FEP), two different molecular weights (MW) of polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) polymer were used as hydrophobic materials in MPL. Membrane electrode assemblies (MEAs) having MPLs with low MW PDMS polymer exhibited the best fuel cell performance compared to the PTFE and FEP based ones. Thus it is concluded that PDMS polymer has a great potential to be used as hydrophobic material for MPL to reduce flooding phenomena in PEM fuel cell. (C) 2017 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.