Effect of Channel Depth and Cell Temperature on the Performance of a Direct Methanol Fuel Cell

Abstract

The main goal of this study is to analyze the performance of the direct methanol single cell using three channel depths at various cell temperatures. The membrane electrode assembly (MEA) used Nafion® 117, by loading a Pt-Ru (4 mg/cm2) catalyst at the anode and Pt-black (4 mg/cm2) catalyst at the cathode. The active area of the MEA was 100 cm (Jung et al., 2009, “Investigation of Flow Bed Design in Direct Methanol Fuel Cell,” J. Solid State Electrochem., 13, pp. 1455–1465). In these sets of experiments, anode and cathode channel depth were varied simultaneously. The cell performance is improved with an increase of temperature in a certain range because the conductivity of the membrane and the reaction kinetics at both the anode and cathode are increased. Also, when the channel depth of the bipolar plate is decreased from 2.0 to 1.0 mm, the cell performance increases. The decreased channel depth leads to an increase in the linear velocity of reactants and products.