The in-plane thermal conductivity and the contact resistance of the components of the membrane electrode assembly in proton exchange membrane fuel cells

Understanding the thermal properties of the materials which are used in a proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEM) is essential for the thermal management of a PEM fuel cell and consequently for improving its performance. In this paper, the parallel thermal conductance technique (PTC) has been employed to obtain the in-plane thermal conductivity and the contact resistance of several components of the membrane electrode assembly (MEA). In addition, the effects of temperature, polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) loading, micro porous layer (MPL) coating and the fibre direction on the in-plane thermal conductivity of the gas diffusion layer (GDL) have been investigated. The in-plane thermal conductivity of the GDL was found to decrease with increasing temperature and increase slightly with increasing PTFE loading and MPL coating. Further, the in-plane thermal conductivity of the membrane increased with higher amounts of water in the membrane. The in-plane thermal conductivity of the catalyst layer was found to be insensitive to the temperature and it increased with platinum loading.