Investigation of Different Electrochemical Corrosion Treatments on Bipolar Plates for High and Low Temperature Polymer Electrolyte Membrane Fuel Cell Application

Abstract

This present research focusses on the corrosion behavior of bipolar plate (BPP) materials for high and low temperature (HT and LT) polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) applications. BPP materials were investigated by different electrochemical corrosion methods using a three-electrode cell setup. Potentiostatic conditions were recorded in concentrated phosphoric acid (PA) and diluted sulfuric acid, respectively, to investigate the stability of BPP for use in HT- and LT-PEMFC. Cyclic voltammograms (CV) were plotted before and after the potentiostatic treatments to evaluate the oxidation resistance behavior of the BPP. Further investigations with methods like scanning electron microscopy (SEM), confocal microscopy, µ-computed tomography (µ-CT) and titration will be shown to correlate surface area changes with corrosion measurement results.