Development of titanium bipolar plates fabricated by additive manufacturing for PEM fuel cells in electric vehicles

Bipolar plates (BPs) are one of the main parts of proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cell stacks, which constitute a significant percentage of a PEM fuel cell system in terms of cost, weight, and structural strength. Although frequently used graphite BPs have low density, high conductivity, and high corrosion resistance, machining the desired flow channels on these plates is challenging. On the other hand, BPs made of various materials rather than graphite can be also fabricated by additive manufacturing methods. These methods can be considered as a reasonable alternative to conventional machining for the fabrication of graphite BPs in PEM fuel cells regarding material cost, fabrication of flow channels, and some post-processes in which the large-scale manufacturing of graphite BPs is more complex. This study offers a comparison of formed stainless-steel, additive manufactured titanium and machined composite graphite plates having the same flow-field geometry as a bipolar plate. In addition, titanium BPs are coated with gold and their performances are compared. Among the cells tested, the highest peak power of 639 mWcm-2 is measured from the cell with 450 nm gold coated titanium BP, whereas those of the cell with con-ventional graphite and stainless-steel BP are only around 322 mWcm-2 and 173 mWcm-2, respectively. Moreover, a new titanium bipolar plate design providing high specific power density is also presented. (c) 2022 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

Bipolar plates are critical components of PEM fuel cell stacks. Machining flow channels on graphite bipolar plates is challenging, so additive manufacturing methods for other materials are considered as alternatives. This study compares the performance of different bipolar plates and presents a high specific power density titanium design.