The use of phase-change cooling strategy in proton exchange membrane fuel cells:A numerical study

Thermal management is considered a critical issue in proton exchange membrane fuel cells(PEMFCs),since it not only influences the cell performance but also impacts PEMFC’s reliability and durability.With the ever-increasing power density of PEMFC,traditional cooling approaches including air cooling and water cooling become difficult to meet the demand for highpower heat dissipation.Therefore,phase-change cooling is proposed for fuel cell application in this work,and the potential advantages are discussed and demonstrated via a mathematical model incorporating phase-change heat transfer.The thermal management performance is evaluated by temperature uniformity,maximum temperature difference,and the cooling capacity to compare the difference between phase-change cooling and traditional methods,which demonstrates that phase-change cooling owns a greatly improved thermal management performance.In addition,a simple method to broaden the operating temperature of phase-change cooling based on one certain coolant is offered,which is pressurizing in the coolant channel to regulate the boiling temperature that could further improve the application feasibility of phase-change cooling strategy in fuel cells.