• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.28 no.5
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• pp.471-480
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• 2017

A proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) operated at $150^{\circ}C$ was evaluated by a controlling different amount of phosphoric acid (PA) to a membrane-electrode assembly (MEA) without humidification of the cells. The effects on MEA performance of the amount of PA in the cathode are investigated. The PA content in the cathodes was optimized for higher catalyst utilization. The highest value of the active electrochemical area is achieved with the optimum amount of PA in the cathode confirmed by in-situ cyclic voltammetry. The current density-voltage experiments (I-V curve) also shows a transient response of cell voltage affected by the amount of PA in the electrodes. Furthermore, this information was compared with the production variables such as hot pressing and vacuum drying to investigate those effect to the electrochemical performances.

• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.439-445
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• 2007

Proton exchange membrane Fuel Cells(PEMFCs) have been spotlighted because of their broad potential application for potable electrical devices, automobiles and residential usages. However, their utilization is limited to low temperature operation due to the electrolyte dehydration at high temperature. High temperature PEMFC operation offers high CO tolerance and easy water management. This review presents development of high temperature($120{\sim}200^{\circ}C$) PEMFC. Especially, PEMFC which is based on acid-doped PBI membrane is discussed.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2009.11a
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• pp.166-169
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• 2009

Poly(benzimidazole-co-aniline) (PBIANI), a self-crosslinked, net-structured, proton conducting polymer has been synthesized for the membrane of high temperature proton exchange membrane fuel cells (HT-PEMFC) with improved proton conductivity and mechanical strength. The stress at break (26$\pm$3MPa)and proton conductivity (167 mS cm-1)of the phosphoric acid doped PBIANI (DPBIANI)membrane is much higher than those of other doped polybenzimidazole(PBI) type membranes.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.1-24
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• 2011

The deficiency of clean water is a major global concern because all the living creatures rely on the drinkable water for survival. On top of this, abundant of clean water supply is also necessary for household, metropolitan inhabitants, industry, and agriculture. Among many purification processes, advances in low-energy membrane separation technology appear to be the most effective solution for water crisis because membranes have been widely recognized as one of the most direct and feasible approaches for clean water production. The aim of this article is to give an overview of (1) two new emerging membrane technologies for water reuse and desalination by forward osmosis (FO) and membrane distillation (MD), and (2) the molecular engineering and development of highly permeable hollow fiber membranes, with polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) and polybenzimidazole (PBI) as the main focuses for the aforementioned applications in National University of Singapore (NUS). This article presents the main results of membrane module design, separation performance, membrane characteristics, chemical modification and spinning conditions to produce novel hollow fiber membranes for FO and MD applications. As two potential solutions, MD and FO may be synergistically combined to form a hybrid system as a sustainable alternative technology for fresh water production.

• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.127-135
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• 2015

High-Temperautre Polymer Electrolyte Membrane Fuel Cell (HT-PEMFC) with phosphoric acid-doped polybenzimidazole (PBI) membrane has high power density because of high operating temperature from 100 to $200^{\circ}C$. In fuel cell stack, heat is generated by electrochemical reaction and high operating temperature makes a lot of heat. This heat is caouse of durability and performance decrease about stack. For these reasons, heat management is important in HT-PEMFC. So, we developed HT-PEMFC model and study heat flow in HT-PEMFC stack. In this study, we placed coolant plate number per cell number ratio as variable and analysed heat flow distribution in stack.

• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.33 no.10
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• pp.3279-3284
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• 2012

Poly(benzimidazole-co-benzoxazole)s (PBI-co-PBO) are synthesized by polycondensation reaction with 3,3'-diaminobenzidine, terephthalic acid and 3,3'-dihydroxybenzidine or 4,6-diaminoresorcinol in polyphosphoric acid (PPA). All polymer membranes are prepared by the direct casting method (in-situ fabrication). The introduction of benzoxazole units (BO units) into a polymer backbone lowers the basic property and $H_3PO_4$ doping level of the copolymer membranes, resulting in the improvement of mechanical strength. The proton conductivity of $H_3PO_4$ doped PBI-co-PBO membranes decrease as a result of adding amounts of BO units. The maximum tensile strength reaches 4.1 MPa with a 10% molar ratio of BO units in the copolymer. As a result, the $H_3PO_4$ doped PBI-co-PBO membranes could be utilized as alternative proton exchange membranes in high temperature polymer electrolyte fuel cells.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.253-265
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• 2016

In this review, we discussed fabrication methods, applications and recent trends of polybenzimidazole membranes which have the highest thermal resistance among the commercial polymers in existence. First of all, basic and modified with specific purpose synthesis method of polybenzimidazole and its own unique features including a mechanical and chemical properties are summarized. Furthermore, various polybenzimidazole membranes are classified by types and methods and, using their excellent properties, various applications and possible field to take advantage of the potential are also summarized. Next, we discussed about not only advantages of polybenzimidazole membranes but also directions of state-of-the-art trends. Lastly, the limit of polybenzimidazole membranes and its complements are also analyzed.

• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.144-154
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• 2016

HT-PEMFC (high temperature polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cell) using PA (phosphoric acid) doped PBI (polybenzimidazole) membrane has been researched for extending the lifetime. However, the existing work on durability of HT-PEMFC focuses on identifying degradation causes of lab scale. The short life time of HT-PEMFC is still the problem for its commercialization. In this paper, an operating method to maximize life time of 5kW HT-PEMFC stack are proposed. The proposed method includes major steps such as minimization of OCV (Open Circuit Voltage) exposure, control of the proper stack temperature, and N2 purging for the stack. This long life operating method was based on the fragmentary results of degradation from previous research works. Experimentally, the 5 kW homemade HT-PEMFC stack was operated for a long time based on the proposed method and the stack successfully can operate within the desired degradation rate for the target life time.

• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.29 no.5
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• pp.442-449
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• 2018

Research on High temperature polymer electrolyte fuel cell (HT-PEMFC) has actively been conducted all over the world. Since the HT-PEMFC can be operated at a high temperature of $120-180^{\circ}C$ using phosphoric acid-doped polybenzimidazole (PBI) electrolyte membrane, it has considerable advantages over conventional PEMFC in terms of operating conditions and system efficiency. However, If the thermal distribution is not uniform in the stack unit, degradation due to local reaction and deterioration of lifetime are difficult to prevent. The thin plate separator reduces the volume of the fuel cell stack and improves heat transfer, consequently, enhancing the cooling effect. In this paper, a large area flow field of thin plate separator for HT-PEMFC is designed and sub-stack is fabricated. We have studied stack performance evaluation under various operating conditions and it has been verified that the proposed design can achieve acceptable stack performance at a wide operating range.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2006.11a
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• pp.467-470
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• 2006

For a mobile application such as cellular phone, micro fuel cells should be extremely compact and thin. RHFC can be an alternative solution because RHFC gives higher power density than DMFC and does not need ahydrogen storage vessel In this paper, RHFC using methanol fuel is made as a novel planar design without a PROX. Both reformer and cell are made closely in a same plate to share the heater of reformer with the cell. The PBI membrane is used in the cell. The reason is that high temperature of reformer can cause a performance drop when perfluorosulfonic acid membrane such as Nafion is used such a high temperature operation also guarantees the higher CO tolerance to MEA catalyst. The cell is designed as an air-breathing type which the cathode of the cell is opened to the air. The commercial Cu/ZnO/Al2O3 steam reformer catalyst is packed in reformer channel. The active area of MEA is $11.9cm^2$ and the peak power density was $27.5mW/cm^2$.