Operating conditions affecting the contact resistance of bi-polar plates in proton exchange membrane fuel cells

摘要

Both ex-situ and in-situ measurements of contact resistance between gas diffusion layer (GDL) and bipolar plate (BPP) were carried out using the same fuel cell hardware. Each BPP sample was submitted to ex-situ testing at room temperature, ex-situ testing in simulated fuel cell environment and in-situ testing, isolating the effect of specific operating conditions on the contact resistance. Increasing cell temperatures and relative humidity (RH) of the gases lowered the contact resistance. However, the presence of liquid water, measured as an increase in pressure drop over the cathode, affected the contact resistance negatively. High current density operation raises the temperature of the cell, but simultaneously increases the water content at the cathode, causing an increase of the contact resistance. In the case of uncoated steel 316L and gold-coated steel 316L, high current density operation for an extended period of time also caused a progressive deterioration of the contact resistance, which without this in-situ measurement could have been mistaken for other ohmic losses, e.g. increased membrane resistance due to metal ion poisoning.