Effects of channel configurations of flow field plates on the performance of a PEMFC

Effects of widths of rib and channel of a flow field plate on the performance of a polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) were studied in an effort to optimize the dimensions of rib and channel of the flow field plates. Performances were measured on the single cells, using four different kinds of flow field plates. The rib width of flow field plates was varied from 0.5 to 3 mm. Narrower the rib width is, performance of a cell becomes improved in the range investigated. In addition, the magnitude of improvement is larger at high currents, indicating that the higher channel area portion is beneficial to the high power operation of a cell. From the results, gas diffusion was suggested to be a more important factor than electric conduction for the better cell performance. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.