A MIXED WETTABILITY PORE SIZE DISTRIBUTION MODEL FOR THE ANALYSIS OF WATER TRANSPORT IN PEMFC MATERIALS

• Author / Creator

  Mateo Villanueva, Pedro Abdiel

• Water management on proton exchange membrane fuel cells is one of the biggest issues that stop the effective commercialization of this promising technology. Due to water flooding, the performance of fuel cells decays rapidly at high current densities. To better design fuel cell electrodes, a mixed wettability pore-size distribution model was developed, and used to estimate the effective transport properties of dry and partially flooded fuel cell porous layers. Using this model, microporous layers and conventional cathode catalyst layers were studied. Results revealed that mass transport limitations can be significantly improved by controlling the wettability and microstructure of the electrodes.

• Subjects / Keywords

  • PEMFC
  • Pore size distribution
  • Multiphase flow
  • Porous media flow
  • Cathode catalyst layer
  • Microporous layer
  • Mixed wettability
  • PEFC

• Graduation date

  Fall 2013

• Type of Item

  Thesis

• Degree

  Master of Science

• DOI

  https://doi.org/10.7939/R3CN6Z65S

• License

  This thesis is made available by the University of Alberta Libraries with permission of the copyright owner solely for non-commercial purposes. This thesis, or any portion thereof, may not otherwise be copied or reproduced without the written consent of the copyright owner, except to the extent permitted by Canadian copyright law.