Three-Dimensional Transport Modeling for Proton Exchange Membrane(PEM) Fuel Cell with Micro Parallel Flow Field

Modeling and simulation for heat and mass transport in micro channel are beingused extensively in researches and industrial applications to gain better understanding of thefundamental processes and to optimize fuel cell designs before building a prototype forengineering application. In this study, we used a single-phase, fully three dimensionalsimulation model for PEMFC that can deal with both anode and cathode flow field forexamining the micro flow channel with electrochemical reaction. The results show thathydrogen and oxygen were solely supplied to the membrane by diffusion mechanism ratherthan convection transport, and the higher pressure drop at cathode side is thought to becaused by higher flow rate of oxygen at cathode. And it is found that the amount of water incathode channel was determined by water formation due to electrochemical reaction pluselectro-osmotic mass flux directing toward the cathode side. And it is very important tomodel the back diffusion and electro-osmotic mass flux accurately since the two flux wasclosely correlated each other and greatly influenced for determination of ionic conductivityof the membrane which directly affects the performance of fuel cell.