THE EFFECTS OF CHANGES IN CELL GEOMETRY AND OPERATING CONDITIONS ON PERFORMANCE IN A PEM FUEL CELL

This study examined the effects of different fuel cell geometries and operating conditions on fuel cell performance.Taking into account the applications and operating conditions of fuel cells, new geometric configurations have been developed that could serve as alternatives to the traditional planar fuel cell design.In this context, designs have been created in triangular, quadrilateral, pentagonal, and hexagonal configurations.Numerical analyses were performed for each design under varying temperatures, pressures, and stoichiometric ratios to compare the responses of the fuel cells to varying operating conditions.Among the fuel cell geometries examined in this study, the highest current density and power performance were achieved in the fuel cell with a quadrilateral geometry, while the lowest current density and power performance were observed in the fuel cell with a triangular geometry.It was also determined that temperature changes have a greater impact on fuel cell performance than pressure and the stoichiometric ratio; specifically, when the temperature rises above 363 K, fuel cell performance decreases by approximately 44%-56%.Furthermore, it was observed that as the pressure increased to 1.4 atm and the stoichiometric ratio rose above 1.5, the change in fuel cell performance remained quite limited.In addition, under varying operating conditions, the most consistent change in performance was observed in the quadrilateral fuel cell, while the most inconsistent change in performance was observed in the triangular fuel cell.In conclusion,