Assessing the performance of reactant transport layers and flow fields towards oxygen transport: A new imaging method based on chemiluminescence

Abstract

A new, simple and precise ex-situ optical imaging method is developed which allows indirect measurement of the partial pressure of oxygen (as ozone) within fuel cell components. Images of oxygen distribution are recorded with higher spatial (∼20 μm) and time (40 ms) resolutions. This approach is applied to assess oxygen concentration across the face of a pseudo polymer electrolyte fuel cell (PEFC), with a serpentine design flow field. We show that the amount of light produced is directly proportional to the partial pressure of ozone, in the same way as the local current density in a PEFC is proportional to the partial pressure of bimolecular oxygen. Hence the simulated system provides information relevant to a PEFC with the same geometry operating at the same stoichiometric ratio. This new approach allows direct imaging of flow under lands due to pressure gradients between the adjacent channels and non-laminar flow effects due to secondary flow around U-turns. These are major discoveries of fundamental importance in guiding materials development and in validating modelling studies. We find that contrary to many simulation papers, advection is an important mechanism in both the gas diffusion layer (more properly “reactant transport layer”) and the microporous layer. Models which do not include these effects may underestimate reactant transport to the catalyst layer.