• Journal of the Korean Electrochemical Society
• /
• v.10 no.1
• /
• pp.25-30
• /
• 2007

Proton exchange membrane fuel cell(PEMFC) performance could be affected by various factors such as cell temperature, total pressure, partial pressure of reactants and relative humidity. Hydrogen ion is combined with water to form hydronium ion [$H_3O^+$] and pass through membrane resulting electricity generation. Cooling system is needed to remove heat and other uses on large scale fuel cell. In case that collant conductivity is increased, fuel cell performance could be decreased because produced electricity could be leaked through coolant. In this study, triple distilled water(TDW) and antifreeze solution containing ethylene glycol was used to observe resistance change. Resistance of TDW was taken 28 days to reach preset value, and effect on fuel cell operation was not observed. Resistance of antifreeze solution was not reached to preset value up to 48 days, but performance failure occurred presumably caused by bipolar plate junction resulting stoppage resistance experiment. Generally PEMFC humidification is performed near-saturated operating conditions at various temperatures and pressures, but non-humidifying condition could be applied in small scale fuel cell to improve efficiency and reduce system cost. However, it was difficult to operate large scale fuel cell without humidifying, especially higher than $50{\sim}60^{\circ}C$. In case of small flux such as 0.78 L/min, temperature difference between inlet and outlet was occurred larger than other cases resulting performance decrease. Non-humidifying performance experiments were done at various cell temperature. When both of anode and cathode humidification were removed, cell performance was strongly depended on cell operating temperature.