Journal
JOURNAL OF THE ELECTROCHEMICAL SOCIETY
Volume 167, Issue 10, Pages -Publisher
ELECTROCHEMICAL SOC INC
DOI: 10.1149/1945-7111/ab9b09
Keywords
electrolyzer; water management; applied voltage breakdown; Theory and Modelling; Electrochemical Engineering
Funding
- Shell's New Energies Research and Technology (NERT)
- Energy & Biosciences Institute through the EBI-Shell Program
- HydroGen Energy Materials Network from the Fuel Cell Technologies Office of DOE
- National Science Foundation [DGE 1752814]
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Water-vapor fed electrolysis, a simplified single-phase electrolyzer using a proton-exchange membrane electrode assembly, achieved >100 mA cm(-2)performance at <1.7 V, the best for water-vapor electrolysis to date, and was tested under various operating conditions (temperature and inlet relative humidity (RH)). To further probe the limitations of the electrolyzer, a mathematical model was used to identify the overpotentials, local water activity, water content values, and temperature within the cell at these various conditions. The major limitations within the water-vapor electrolyzer are caused by a decreased water content within the membrane phase, indicated by increased Ohmic and mass transport losses seen in applied voltage breakdowns. Further investigations show the water content (lambda, mole of water/mole of sulfonic acid) can decrease from 13 at low current densities down to 6 at high current densities. Increasing the temperature or decreasing RH exacerbates this dry-out effect. Using our mathematical model, we show how these mass transport limitations can be alleviated by considering the role of water as both a reactant and a hydrating agent. We show that low cathode RH can be tolerated as long as the anode RH remains high, showing equivalent performance as symmetric RH feeds.
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