Pore-network Study of Liquid Water Transport through Multiple Gas Diffusion Medium in PEMFCs

고분자 연료전지의 다공성층 내에서의 액상수분 이동에 관한 공극-네트워크 해석 연구

Water is continuously produced in polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cell (PEMFC), and is transported and exhausted through polymer electrolyte membrane (PEM), catalyst layer (CL), microporous layer (MPL), and gas diffusion layer (GDL). The low operation temperatures of PEMFC lead to the condensation of water, and the condensed water hinders the transport of reactants in porous layers (MPL and GDL). Thus, water flooding is currently one of hot issues that should be solved to achieve higher performance of PEMFC. This research aims to study liquid water transport in porous layers of PEMFC by using pore-network model, while the microscale pore structure and hydrophilic/hydrophobic surface properties of GDL and MPL were fully considered.