ON THE EFFICIENCY OF PROTON EXCHANGE MEMBRANE ELECTROLYZER: NUMERICAL ANALYSIS

Researchers have often turned to the search for clean and stable energy systems in recent years.The most promising energy carrier is hydrogen as the best solution for alternative energy.It can be stored in more weight than other fuels in the same volume.Hydrogen is produced in different ways, but the simplest and most promising is water electrolysis.The chemical reaction process that occurs in water electrolysis splits water into oxygen and hydrogen molecules.A proton exchange membrane water electrolysis (PEMWE) system is environmentally friendly and relatively easy to integrate with renewable energy sources such as photovoltaic and wind.The present work focuses on analyzing the effect of different anode nanocatalysts on the performance of PEMWE.For this purpose, the temperature regime, membrane thickness, current carrying length and molar fraction distribution of substances in the gas channels are investigated to observe and compare the effects of different nanocatalysts.The performance of the electrolysis cell is modeled using a point and distributed numerical scheme based on Control Metaphysics software.The ways to increase the hydrogen yield with changes in temperature and membrane thickness are investigated.The results show that the use of thinner membrane is important for the Ni-NiO2 nanocatalyst compared to the Pt catalyst.The Ni-NiO2 catalyst reduces the cell voltage and provides higher current density.The maximum value of the molar fraction of hydrogen in the gas channel of the cathode increases by more than 50%.The theoretical and experimental results obtained here can find application in the implementation of industrial technologies in the Tajik Aluminum Company (TALCO) and Yavan Electrochemical Plant (Tajikistan).