Volume 23: Sustainable Energy Solutions for a Post-COVID Recovery towards a Better Future: Part VI

Experimental investigation of operating condition and membrane effects on anion exchange membrane fuel cells Kai Chen, Zixuan Wang, Bowen Wang, Zhijun Peng, Qing Du, Kui Jiao

Abstract

Anion exchange membrane is the core component, and also the key development direction of alkaline fuel cells. In this paper, three popular commercialized anion exchange membranes (Orion 30 μm mechanically reinforced membrane, Orion 5 μm mechanically reinforced membrane, and Alkymer 25 μm membrane) were selected to investigate the effects of different temperature, humidity, stoichiometric ratio and other operating condition factors on the alkaline fuel cell. The experimental results show that the Orion membrane has more stable performance than Alkymer when the cathode stoichiometry ratio changes. The ohmic impedance and activation impedance of the Alkymer membrane decrease as the temperature increases, and thus the operating temperature can be properly increased to improve the fuel cell performance for Alkyme. Humidity change would significantly change the level of membrane hydration, which influences the membrane conductivity. It is also found that the ohmic impedance of Alkymer is more stable than that Orion when the humidity is reduced, and a slight reduction of humidity could improve the fuel cell performance in our experiments.

Keywords Anion exchange membrane, Alkaline fuel cell, Experimental, Operating condition effect, Orion and Alkymer