Characterization of Commercial Gas Diffusion Layers (GDL) by Liquid Extrusion Porometry (LEP) and Gas Liquid Displacement Porometry (GLDP).

René I Peinador,José I Calvo,Oumaima Abba

doi:10.3390/membranes12020212

Abstract

This works aims to study the porous characterization of several commercial Gas Diffusion Layers (GDL). Three carbon-based porous GDL featuring a highly rigid microstructure of interconnected pores of several manufacturers were analyzed. Gas Liquid Displacement Porometry (GLDP) and Liquid Extrusion Porometry (LEP) have been used to obtain their pore size distributions (PSD) and the mean and mode pore diameters (davg and dmod), by means of a gas/liquid and extrusion porometer developed at IFTS. N-dodecane liquid has been used to completely wet the GDL’s assuring penetration of the liquid into the carbon fibrous structure. The results demonstrated the accuracy of the setup on characterizing GDL in the Particle Filtration (PF) range by GLDP and LEP, with reasonable agreements of resulting PSD and average sizes between both techniques when GLDP and LEP results are compared. Differences can be explained in terms of the high pore connectivity of these kinds of structures.

Highlights

Climate change is a global problem that is widely recognized by the international scientific community
The pore size distributions (PSD) of three GLD were obtained via Gas Liquid Displacement Porometry (GLDP), depending on the size of pores population for each sample
PSD was characterized via Liquid Extrusion Porometry (LEP) based on the extrusion mass of the wetting liquid by air for the case of Gas Diffusion Layers (GDL)

Summary

Introduction

Climate change is a global problem that is widely recognized by the international scientific community. One of the main causes that contribute to this change is the emission of greenhouse gases, CO2 as a consequence of human economic activity Faced with this climate emergency, the Paris Agreement proposes a drastic reduction in the sources of CO2 creation, especially fossil fuels, which are responsible for much of this degradation. It is estimated that global energy demand at 2040 will rise by a 37% than compared with 2014 levels [1], making it increasingly complicated to match such increasing demands with sustainable and environmentally friendly practices. In this sense, fuel cells are called to play a very important role in the coming years

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