Three-dimensional performance simulation of PEMFC of metal foam flow plate reconstructed with improved full morphology.

Recently, Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell (PEMFC) with metal foam flow field has attracted extensive attention from scholars. In the present work, the full morphological reconstruction method of metal foam is improved and is successfully applied to a three-dimensional simulation of a metal foam PEMFC. The numerical predictions of metal foam PEMFC before and after reconstruction improvement are compared. The numerical results of the traditional channel flow field and two metal foam flow fields with pore sizes (40PPI and 100PPI) are compared. It is found that the application of metal foam can greatly improve the performance of PEMFC at higher current densities, and the smaller pore size (100PPI) of the metal foam makes the performance better. In addition, the numerical results of the oxygen concentration, ohmic loss, intra-membrane ionic current density and pressure drop of the cathode component are elaborated to explain the phenomenon. • 3D numerical simulation of flow field improvement for PEMFC. • Improved method for full morphological reconstruction of metal foam. • Build sufficient metal foam-GDL contact area. • Denser metal foam PEMFC offers better performance at high current densities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]