Differences in structure and property of carbon paper and carbon cloth diffusion media and their impact on proton exchange membrane fuel cell flow field design

Gas diffusion media (GDM) and flow fields perform the task of distributing the reactant gases uniformly over the active electrochemical area in proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cells. Carbon paper and carbon cloth are two commonly employed gas diffusion media in PEM fuel cells, and they differ widely in their structure and properties. Since the path of the reactant gases to the catalyst in the fuel cell electrodes involves passing through the flow fields as well as the GDM, a good design for a fuel cell requires an understanding of the interaction between these components. The focus of the present work is to study the impact of the difference in structure and properties of the diffusion media used, on the design of the PEM fuel cell flow field. Carbon paper and carbon cloth were characterized for the pressure drop they cause when used as GDMs, for channel intrusion, compressibility and electrical resistivity. Carbon cloth exhibits about 43–125% more intrusion into the channel in comparison with carbon paper for the conditions tested. This intrusion results in increased pressure drop in the flow channel especially at higher channel widths and at higher compression. Compression studies reveal that carbon cloth lacks compression rigidity and suffers considerable strain at lower stress values whereas carbon paper is relatively rigid in nature. The results indicate that the intrusion of carbon cloth into the channel, constraints the channel width in a flow field design if it were to be used with a carbon cloth GDM as opposed to a carbon paper GDM. Electrical resistivity measurements were carried out and a simple mathematical model has been developed for the potential drop in the GDM. The model indicates that even from the perspective of electrical properties, use of carbon cloth GDM constraints the channel width that is permissible in flow field design.