Characterisation of MT-PEM Based Stack for Application in Micro-Combined Heat and Power Systems

The EURECA project deals with the development of a new generation of MT-PEM (middle temperature polymer electrolyte membrane) based Fuel Cell (FC) stacks for application in micro-combined heat and power (µ-CHP) systems. This should lead to an improvement of tolerance for contaminants like CO^[1] compared to low temperature (LT) as well as faster and energy saving start-stop procedures compared to HT-PEM technology^[2]. Therefore, a material development starting from catalyst and membrane materials up to a new stack design are parts of the projects.

We have shown an increase in performance by applying optimized parameter to a commercial stack up to 8% for a commercial LT-PEM FC stack.^[3] Here we report the parameter optimisation of a newly developed MT-PEM stack. As a basis for the applied protocols the suggestion of FCTES^{QA [4]} were taken into account. After application of different protocols dealing with parameters like humidification, for example, we expect higher performances and working conditions for a stable and reliable operation of the stack. The new parameters for the MT PEM stack will then be adapted to the system to end up with a more robust, stable and less cost intensive µ-CHP system.

[1] H. Ju, K.-S. Lee and S. Um, J. Mech. Sci. Technol., 22, 991 (2008). [2] 2. S. J. Andreasen, L. Ashworth, I. N. M. Remon and S. K. Kaer, Int. J. Hydrogen Energy, 33, 7137 (2008). [3] http://iet.jrc.ec.europa.eu/fuel-cells/about-fctesqa-project [4] N. Jacobs, J. Büsselmann, S. Theuring, M. Zobel, A. Dyck, ECS Transactions, 58 (1) 197-208 (2013)