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Carcadea, E., Ismail, M.S., Ingham, D.B. et al. (6 more authors) (2021) Effects of
geometrical dimensions of flow channels of a large-active-area PEM fuel cell: A CFD study.
International Journal of Hydrogen Energy, 46 (25). pp. 13572-13582. ISSN 0360-3199

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Effects of geometrical dimensions of flow channels of a large-active-area PEM fuel cell: a CFD
study
E. Carcadeaa*, M.S. Ismailb, D.B. Inghamb, L. Patularua, D. Schiteaa, A. Marinoiua, D. Ebrasua,
D. Mocanua and M. Varlama
a
National Research and Development Institute for Cryogenics and Isotopic Technologies - ICSI
Rm. Valcea, 240050, Romania
b
Energy2050, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University of
Sheffield, Sheffield S10 2TN, UK
(*) [email protected]

Abstract

Various flow field designs have been numerically investigated to evaluate the effect of pattern
and the cross-sectional dimensions of the channel on the performance of a large active area PEM fuel
cell. Three types of multiple-serpentine channels (7-channels, 11-channels and 14-channels) have been
chosen for the 200 cm2 fuel cell investigated and numerically analysed by varying the width and the
land of the channel. The CFD simulations showed that as the channel width decreases, as in the 14-
channels serpentine case, the performance improves, especially at high current densities where the
concentration losses are dominant. The optimum configuration, i.e. the 14-channels serpentine, has
been manufactured and tested experimentally and a very good agreement between the experimental
and modelling data was achieved. 4 channel depths have been considered (0.25, 0.4, 0.6 and 0.8 mm)
in the CFD study to determine and the effects on the pressure drop and water content is described. Up
to 7 % increase in the maximum reported current density has been achieved for the smallest depth and
this due to the better removal of excess liquid water and better humidification of the membrane. Also,
the influence of the air flow rate has been evaluated: the current density at 0.6V increased by around
25% when air flow rate was increased 4 times; this is attributed to better removal of excess liquid water.

Keywords: PEM fuel cell; numerical model; flow field design; water management; large active
area; performance improvement.

1. Introduction

Hydrogen and fuel cells have paved the way for integrated energy systems that concomitantly
approach the main energy and environmental challenges and have the versatility to adapt to the various
renewable and intermittent energy sources that are existing worldwide. Although a significant amount
of research has been carried out in the last decades in the fuel cell domain and successful demonstration
projects are available [1], there is still a large demand to sustain the development of this technology.
Enhanced products due to improved designs of some of the component (catalyst, membrane, gas
diffusion layer and bipolar plate) and the system level are required to meet the performance, durability
and cost targets [2], in order for fuel cells to become competitive for automotive, portable and
stationary applications against the current available solutions. The Fuel Cell and Hydrogen Joint
Undertaking (FCH JU) vision for 2030 points out that for driving down the costs, while keeping an
acceptable level of performance and durability, it is necessary to progress at a lab-scale level to achieve
fundamental improvements in all the components of the fuel cell.
Design parameters, such as flow field pattern or channel dimensions (width, depth), are key
factors for Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells operation due to their impact on the performance
and durability. A good distribution and uniformity of reacting species, without dead zones,
minimization of the pressure loss or a better water and heat management are just a few critical
challenges that can be addressed by flow field design optimization [3-9]. Without control, a variation
in the water generation and elimination can occur and both of the consequences (i.e. dehydration or
flooding) have a very harmful effect on the performance [10]. One of the key component, the
membrane electrolyte, requires water in order to exhibit good protonic conductivity, but in the other
layers of the fuel cell, the amount of liquid water should be kept to the minimum. Liquid water must
be prevented from accumulating on the electrode surfaces, in the pores of the gas diffusion layer, and
in the fluid flow fields. The presence of liquid water in these regions will hinder the diffusion of
reactants to the catalyst active sites, thus degrading the performance [11-12]. An effective water
management will control and adjust the transport of water in such a way that a sufficient amount of
water is maintained in the proton conductive phases, and the excess liquid water will be purged from
the cell with the same rate as it is produced, with minimum blockage of the gas transport paths.
Several channel configurations (serpentine [13-15, 28][13-17], parallel [16,30] [18-20], interdigitated
[21], pin type or combinations [18-19, 26] [22-26]) or channel to land sizes have been employed so far
in numerical and experimental investigations for enhancing the PEM fuel cell overall performance.
Each configuration has pros and cons related to the phenomena taking place inside the fuel cell layers,
the mass and heat transport challenges being the most frequently reported. Pin type or parallel channels
feature a lower pressure drop but an uneven distribution of reactants and products, resulting in the
stagnation of water. Lim et al. [20] proposed a modified parallel flow field which was found to:
overcome the latter drawbacks, increase the uniformity of the distribution of the current density, and
improve cell performance due to better supply of reacting gases and improved removal of excess liquid
water. A relatively large pressure drop, featured by serpentine channels, can effective eliminate the
liquid water collected in the flow fields but leads to use of higher pumping power. The relatively low
pressure drop can be realised in parallel flow channels, but they are prone to flooding [7]. By replacing
the channels with open pore cellular foam, as in the research of Wilberforce et al. [25], pressure drop
is minimised and the cell performance is doubled compared with those of the serpentine flow channels.
On the other hand, the serpentine channels demonstrate a larger pressure drop [27] due to the larger
channel length, although flooding can appear in the bending zones. As regards to the channel to land
ratio, channel cross-section dimensions (i.e. width and depth) and cross section design (e.g.
rectangular, trapezoidal, triangular and curved), there are several studies that have investigated the
influence of the above-mentioned factors on some local transport phenomena that can affect the fuel
cell performance: under land convection [7], distribution of reactant and temperature [18] [22] and,
dynamics of liquid water [28] [16]. The channel-to-land ratio larger than 1 (meaning channel width
larger than land width) is recommended for efficient water removal, effective transport of the reactants
to the gas diffusion layers and ultimately reduced voltage losses; however, mechanical instability (the
bulge of gas diffusion layers into the channels) and poor thermal and electrical contacts [7,12] are
potential issues with high channel-to-land ratios.
Among several types of design for flow channels, the multiple serpentine-parallel channels [10,
22, 37-38] [10, 28-30] have proved to be one of the most effective designs for the removal of liquid
water, especially for fuel cells with large sizes of the active areas.
The scaling up of PEM fuel cells has led to disputed conclusions. In the study of Vijayakrishnan
[36] [31] it was concluded that by scaling up the PEM fuel cell geometry, from 25 cm2 to 70 cm2, the
performance decreases, this being also valid in [38] [30] where the cross flow and triple serpentine
channels have been investigated and a reduction in performance was achieved by scaling up the
geometry from 50 to 200 cm2. In another publication [20] [32] the performance did not suffer a
decrease and contrarily an improvement was achieved by increasing the active area of the cell from 50
to 441 cm2, in case of an adequate water management is achieved. The present investigation of a 200
cm2 active area fuel cell is considered adequate for fuel cell developers and integrators, far exceeding
the area of 1 to 25 cm2 used in research laboratories for materials development, as well as areas of
around 100 cm2 used in demonstration projects. The advantages of using 200 cm2 fuel cells comes
from the variety of applications that can integrate such large-scale electrochemical devices, from
stationary, portable to automotive applications. There are numerous challenges in the scaling-up of the
PEM fuel cell [21, 36-37] [31, 33-35], of which the mass transport limitations are the key challenges
due to their detrimental effect on the performance and durability. The present work numerically
investigates a large size PEM fuel cell used in a stack of a micro-grid application, an exploded view
of the cell with some of the components is presented in Fig. 1. Based on previous results, an extension
of the lab scale (5 cm2) fuel cell [29] [36] and medium scale demonstration project (44 cm2) fuel cell
[30] [19] to the real size PEM fuel cell is done in order to investigate critical issues that can affect the
cell performance and can have a detrimental effect on its operation.
 Although a significant number of fuel cell models have been developed so far by various research
teams [13-14, 23, 31-32, 37-39] and some CFD vendors [33] [40], there is still a need for a
comprehensive model to better understand the parameters affecting the performance and to enable
more-informed scaling-up of PEM fuel cells [36] [31]. Two design methods of the flow-field design
have been considered in this study: the pattern of the flow channels and the cross-sectional dimensions
(i.e. the width and the depth) of the flow channels. The effects of other detailed chemistry and
electrochemistry processes, charge transport, heat and water generation are taken into account and are
based on optimized values obtained in previous investigations [29] [36]. The numerical results are
validated against experimental data for an optimum pattern fuel cell that have been manufactured (14-
channels serpentine configuration) and a good agreement was found, revealing that CFD can be a
powerful modelling tool that can lead to improvements in performance and a reduction in the time and
costs required for experiments. Such investigations can move forward the scale-up of the fuel cell
manufacturing lines from small to large size fuel cells.

2. Mathematical Model and Numerical Implementation

The mathematical model used to analyse the effects of geometrical dimensions of the flow
channels on a large active area PEM fuel cell performance is three-dimensional, non-isothermal and
deals with multi-physics and multi-phase flows. The conservation equations for mass, momentum,
species, charge and energy are taken into consideration, and the ANSYS Fluent solver with the PEM
Fuel Cell Module [33] [40] has been used based on some assumptions and boundary conditions. The
Gauss-Seidel method was chosen for solving the system of equations applied to describe the PEM fuel
cell operation.
A comprehensive mathematical model with all conservation equations that describe the PEM
fuel cell operation has been presented in previous works [29-30] [19, 36], therefore it will not be
repeated here. However, for the convenience of readers, a brief model description is given hereafter:
the mass, momentum, species, charge and energy conservation equations are solved for understanding
the effect of the geometrical design on the complex phenomena that take place in fuel cells, and
consequently on the performance. Source terms are included in the transport equations to account for
the electrochemical reactions (species diffusion, consumption, generation), for the effects of the porous
media, for heat generation and for implementing changes in material properties and common boundary
conditions. Steady state conditions, non-isothermal operation, ideal gas mixtures, laminar flow,
isotropic and homogenous components are considered in this study. The water existing in different
forms, as gas, liquid or in dissolved state, as well as the effect of the catalyst complex microstructure
have been taken into consideration in our previous model and are used as inputs in this study. The aim
is to comprehensively investigate the water management influence on a large active area PEM fuel cell
performance.
The boundary conditions prescribed for solving the conservation equations are only for the
external surfaces, the fuel cell being treated as a single domain. Accordingly, Dirichlet boundary
conditions are used for gas flow inlets: mass flow rate, species mass fractions and temperature.
Potentiostatic boundary conditions have been used for the external walls, the anode wall being
grounded to zero volts and the cathode terminal wall to a constant voltage with the maximum value
equal to the open circuit value. After assigning relevant values for the operating conditions and material
properties, as in Tables 1 and 2, the flow is initialized and the simulation starts. It is recommend to
start with a high voltage, close to the open circuit voltage, and then to use steps of 0.05–0.1 volts
between each converged solution. An average current density is calculated at both the anode and the
cathode catalyst layers for each iteration. If the difference between these values is less than 10-4 and
the residuals for the other scalar variables considered in the model fall to a small value (i.e. 10-6) then
the iterations will stop and the solution is considered convergent. For convergence problems, it is
recommended to decrease the under-relaxation factors for the transport equations to values that do not
affect the accuracy of the results.
 Table 1. The physical parameters used in the model [29, 30] [19, 36].
Parameter Value Unit
GDL/MPL/CL porosity (  ) 0.7/0.6/0.5 -
-12 -12 -13
GDL/MPL/CL permeability (K) 3×10 /1×10 /2×10 m2
Anodic reference exchange current density ( jaref ) 10000 A/m2
Cathodic reference exchange current density ( jcref ) 1 A/m2
GDL/MPL/CL contact angle (  c ) 110/130/95 ⁰
Open circuit voltage (Voc) 0.962 V
Membrane thickness 14 µm
GDL thickness 255 µm
MPL thickness 25 µm
Anode/ Cathode Catalyst layer thickness 5/12 µm
Dry membrane density (  i ) 2000 kg/m3
Equivalent weight of the membrane ( EW ) 1100 kg/kmol

Table 2. The boundary conditions used in the model [29, 30] [19, 36].
Parameter Value Unit
Anodic mass flow rate at inlet 8×10-6 kg/s
-4
Cathodic mass flow rate at inlet 1.1×10 kg/s
H2 mass fraction at anode inlet 0.554 -
H2O mass fraction for at anode inlet 0.446 -
O2 mass fraction for at cathode inlet 0.22 -
H2O mass fraction for at cathode inlet 0.053 -
Relative humidity at anode/cathode inlets 80 % -
Temperature at anode/cathode inlets 55 °C

The ANSYS Fluent 2019 R3 has been utilized to investigate the geometrical design influence on
the water management and performance of fuel cells. The base case parameters, operating and
boundary conditions as presented in Tables 1 and 2 have been used in all cases simulated, unless
otherwise specified. Polarization curves are obtained after running the simulations, one simulation
giving one point from the polarization curve. A High Performance Computer (HPC) with 32 processes
and 64 GB of RAM shared on 2 workstations have been used for the parallel processing of the cases
investigated in order to reduce the time required for obtaining a converged solution. Approximatively
3 hours it takes to obtain 1 point on the polarization curve, using parallel processing.
The computational geometries have been built using the Gambit® 2.4.6 pre-processing software
and the grid-independent solution have been found for all fuel cells investigated. 3 patterns based on
the serpentine configuration have been used (7-channels, 11-channels and 14-channels) and 4 depths
(0.25, 0.4, 0.6 and 0.8 mm). The mesh for all cases investigated is between 4.8 and 6.4 million elements
and this ensures the mesh-independent solutions, the case with 14-channels serpentine PEM fuel cell
is showed in Fig. 2 1. The sizes and the design of the 200 cm2 fuel cell are comparable with those of a
real fuel cell. The same configuration for the anode and cathode channels have been used, the patterns
and sizes of the configurations investigated are presented in Table 3. Also, the contact area between
the bipolar plate (BP) and gas diffusion layer (GDL) is reported. Also, the contact area between the
bipolar plate (BP) and gas diffusion layer (GDL) is reported. The BP bipolar plate is 200 mm × 100
mm in the x- and y– directions and its thickness depends on the channel depth.
 channel

Gas Diffusion Layer

Gas Diffusion Layer

Bipolar
Plate Micro Porous Layer
Catalyst Layer
Membrane

Gas diffusion layer

Fig. 1 – PEM fuel cell computational mesh in the cross section (x-y) and flow direction (x-z) for 14-
channels serpentine configuration.

Regarding the numerical methods and the interpolation schemes used in the CFD investigations,
it is known that a converged and mesh-independent solution of a well-posed problem will provide
helpful results only if an appropriate setup is chosen. Higher-order interpolation schemes, such as the
second-order upwind and QUICK, offer improved accuracy for the numerical simulations, therefore a
second-order upwind scheme has been used in all the simulations.

Table 3 Patterns and sizes of the flow field channels investigated.

Pattern Channel width Land width Channel depth Contact area
between GDL-BP
7-channels 2.4 mm 2.4 mm 0.6 mm
99,81 cm2
serpentine (base case)
11-channels 1.6 mm 1.4 mm 0.6 mm
100,95 cm2
serpentine (base case)
0.25 mm
0.4 mm
14-channels
1.2 mm 1.2 mm 0.6 mm 104,81 cm2
serpentine
(base case)
0.8 mm

3. Results and Discussions

A computational fluid dynamics (CFD) investigation based on the ANSYS Multiphysics

software and PEM Fuel Cell Module have been applied to analyse the impact of the flow field pattern
and dimensions on a 200 cm2 PEM fuel cell performance. 3 patterns for the fluid flow channels have
been used in the numerical investigation, namely: a 7-channels serpentine, an 11-channels serpentine
and a 14-channels serpentine. The optimum pattern has been used further to analyse the effect of the
channel depth on the water management and accordingly on the PEM fuel cell performance. Also, the
sensitivity of the mass transport limitations to air mass flow rate is discussed.

3.1 Model Validation

A comparison between the numerical results and experimental data was performed to validate
the model. For numerical model, the 14-channels serpentine fuel cell with 0.6 mm channel depth and
1.2 mm land and channel width have been used as a base case. The 200 cm2 PEM fuel cell adopted in
the experimental investigations and the test station were developed in-house, see Fig. 3 2. The test
station used for experiments has a power range between 1-1500 watts and fully adjustable working
parameters (stoichiometry, pressures, humidity, and temperature). It includes: gas heated lines to
prevent water condensation, back-pressure regulators and mass flow controllers, pressure valves and
sensors, bubble humidifiers with an adaptable water level and temperature for humidifying the air and
hydrogen streams up to 99% RH and dew point up to 65°C, and an electronic load for simulating the
operating conditions. The polarisation curve of the fuel cell was obtained using a PLA800 60-300
electrical load bridge by applying various cell potentials in the range of the open circuit voltage (0.962
V) and 0.4 V, thus determining the corresponding currents. At each current point, the stoichiometry of
gases was calculated using Faradaic low and used to set the mass flow controllers. The stoichiometric
coefficients used in the experiments for hydrogen and air were 1.2 and 2.5, respectively.
A membrane electrode assembly (MEA), developed by HyPlat in South Africa, has been used in
the experiments. This MEA was based on a 100 mm x 200 mm GDL from Freudenberg GmbH, H23C9
type, and incorporates an 18µm thin Gore M735.18 membrane, with 0.1 and 0.4 mg/cm2 Pt loadings
in the anode and cathode catalyst layers. The fuel cell set up has two 32 mm thick fiberglass high
strength end plates that incorporates 2mm gold coated cooper plates for current collecting. The anode
and cathode flow fields were CNC machined into graphite plates from IRD FuelCells Denmark.
To validate the numerical model, a comparison of the polarization curves obtained
experimentally and numerically have been performed. A good agreement between the two sets of
results was obtained, the trend of the modelling data follow that of the experimental data; see Fig. 4 3.

Fig. 3 2 – The fuel cell components: collector plate (top left), bipolar plate (medium left) and MEA with
gasket (bottom left), and the test station used in experiments (right).
Fig. 4 3 – The polarisation curves of the 14-channels serpentine fuel cell: experimental and simulated

3.2. Influence of the flow channels pattern

The CFD model has been used to analyse the impact of the flow channels pattern on the fuel
cell performance. Serpentine configurations with multiple channels have been considered for the 200
cm2 fuel cells; the aim was to ensure a balance between the electrical conductivity requirement and
gas transport efficiency. Therefore, three configurations have been obtained, namely: a 7-channels
serpentine, an 11- channels serpentine and a 14- channels serpentine, as a result of the variation of the
widths of both the flow channel and land; see Table 3. By decreasing the channels width from 2.4 mm
to 1.2 mm an improvement of the performance has been achieved starting from medium to high current
densities, as presented in Fig. 5 4. It can be noticed that the geometrical effect on the performance is a
function of the operating conditions: at low current densities the channels width effect is negligible; at
medium current densities, the improved electrical contact between the flow field plates and GDLs, as
presented in Table 3, leads to a reduction in the ohmic losses and consequently to an increase in
performance; while at high current densities, where more liquid water is produced, the influence of
decreasing the channels width become more significant. By decreasing the channel width, the gas
velocity increases, facilitating the liquid water removal; see Fig. 6 5 which shows that water saturation
is maximum for the case with 14-channels serpentine. As a consequence, the transport of oxygen will
not be obstructed and the increase in performance in the mass transport losses region is explained. The
results are in accordance with those found in [35] [41].

Fig. 5 4 - Polarization curves for various patterns of the flow channels.

 Fig. 6 5 – Liquid water saturation at the mid-thickness of the cathode channel for the PEM fuel cell
with:7-channels serpentine, (b) 11-channels serpentine, and (c) 14- channels serpentine.

The flow-field plate with 14-serpentine channels showed the best performance. This
configuration has been manufactured and experimentally tested using an in-house fuel cell test station,
and has been used to further analyse the impact of the channel depth variation on the fuel cell
performance. The influence of the air flow rate on the fuel cell performance has also been studied
based on this configuration.

3.3. Influence of the flow field depth

The 14-channels serpentine fuel cell has been used to investigate the channel depth influence
on the performance and on the mass transport related parameters. For a given channel width of 1.2
mm, 4 geometries with various depths have been considered, namely: 0.25 mm, 0.4 mm, 0.6 mm and
0.8 mm. Smaller channel depths are required to have lighter bipolar plates and to make fuel cell stacks
integration possible in applications that requires low volume and weight, such as portable applications.
The polarization curves are obtained after running numerical simulations for each case taking a
potential difference between the anode and the cathode in the range 0.962-0.4V; the results are
presented in Fig. 7 6. The findings show that the current density increases by 7% by decreasing the
channel depth from 0.8 mm to 0.25 mm at 0.4V.
It is known that a critical challenge for the design of the flow fields and bipolar plates is to
ensure an appropriate water management [11, 27] and reactant transport; therefore, the channels should
effectively remove the accumulated water to avoid the flooding problem and at the same time allow
the reactants to reach the catalyst layers where the electrochemical reactions occur. It is important to
decrease the parasitic losses which are directly linked to the pressure drop along the channels. A higher
pressure drop can effectively eliminate the water accumulated in the flow channels, but demands
higher pumping power. The ideal flow field is expected to overcome the problem of flooding at as low
pressure drop as possible. The multiple-serpentine flow channels have a pressure drop greater than the
other types of channels due to the large length of the channel and the many turns that the flow makes.
Although the water produced is removed efficiently, the outlet regions can be prone to flooding and
the membrane can dehydrate in the inlet region for the serpentine configuration, as can be seen in Fig.
8 7. Managing the membrane water content is a requirement for ensuring a high protonic conductivity
since a well humidified membrane will allow the protons to pass through and reduce the ohmic losses.

Fig. 7 6 Polarization curves for different channel depths.

At high current densities, a large amount of water is produced and this tends to accumulates in
the channels, so the pressure drop become the most important factor in the elimination of the excess
water and in facilitating the transport of oxygen. The polarization curves, presented in Fig. 7 6, shows
that the best performance is achieved at the smallest channel depth (0.25 mm) investigated. The
pressure drop for each case, using the same boundary conditions, is reported for the anode and cathode
channels, see Table 4. It can be noticed that there is a significant increase in the pressure drop as the
channel depth decreases; the results are in accordance with the findings of several studies [7-10].

Air Air

Air Air

Air Air

Air Air

Fig. 8 7 – Profiles of the water content at the interface between the anodic cathodic CL and membrane
at 0.6 V with different channel depths: (a) 0.25 mm, (b) 0.4 mm, (c) 0.6 mm and (d) 0.8 mm.

Table 4 Maximum Pressure drop reported in PEM fuel cell channels.

Channel Depth Pressure drop in anode channel Pressure drop in cathode channel
0.8 mm 368 Pa 1327 Pa
0.6 mm 683 Pa 2499 Pa
0.4 mm 1835 Pa 6509 Pa
0.25 mm 5254 Pa 17841 Pa
 3.4. Influence of the air flow rate

One of the critical parameters for PEM fuel cell performance is the mass flow rate of the
reacting gases [25, 34] [41-42]. As the mass flow rate of the air increases quadruples, the fuel cell
perform significantly better and the distribution of the current density becomes more uniform; see Fig.
9 8. This is due to the increased availability of oxygen for the electrochemical reactions (see Fig. 10
9a) and the increased effectiveness of removal of water (see Fig. 9b). It could be clearly seen from the
plots D in Fig. 10 9a and Fig. 10 9b that the highest amount of oxygen and the lowest amount of water
at the interface between the cathode catalyst layer and the micro-porous layer are obtained for the
maximum reported flow rate, i.e. 4 x 10-4 kg/s. Fig. 9c shows that difference between the flow rates of
water entering and exiting the cathode flow channel slightly increases with increasing air flow rate,
signalling that the less water is available at the cathode side with increasing air flow rate and
confirming the contour plots presented in Fig. 9(b). These findings are in accordance with those of
Yang et al. [46].

Fig. 9 8 – Current density plot and profiles in the middle of the membrane for various air flow rates:
(A) 1.1e-4 kg/s, (B) 1.5e-4 kg/s, (C) 2e-4 kg/s and (D) 4e-4 kg/s.

A Air B Air

C Air D Air

(a)
 A Air B Air

C Air D Air

(b)

2.5E-05
H2O flow rate (kg/s)

2.0E-05

1.5E-05

1.0E-05

5.0E-06 H2O flow rate at cathode channel inlet

H2O flow rate at cathode channel outlet
0.0E+00
0.0E+00 1.0E-04 2.0E-04 3.0E-04 4.0E-04
Air flow rate at cathode inlet(kg/s) (c)

Fig. 10 9 – (a) Oxygen mass fraction, (b) Water mass fraction profiles at the interface between the
cathode CL and MPL at 0.6V for various air flow rates: (A) 1.1e-4, (B) 1.5e-4, (C) 2e-4 and (D) 4e-4 kg/s;
and (c)Water flow rate at cathode channel inlet and outlet (kg/s) as a function of air flow rate (kg/s) at
the cathode inlet.

4. Conclusions

A CFD model for a 200 cm² active area PEM fuel cell has been used to analyse the effect of the
flow channels design on the fuel cell performance. To achieve this, different patterns and different
cross-sectional dimensions have been investigated. The CFD results were in very good agreement with
the experimental data obtained from the fuel cell run with the 14-channels serpentine (base case –
channels with 0.6 mm width). The main results of the investigation are summarized as follows:
(i) As the number of channels of the serpentine configuration increases from 7 to 14 (or as the
channel width-to-land width ratio decreases), the fuel cell performs better, especially at the high
current densities. This is attributed to the improved electrical contact between the flow-field
plates and the GDLs and the increased rate of supply of reacting gases to the active area in CLs.
An increase of 5% in the contact area between bipolar plate and GDL leads to an increase of
15% in current density at 0.6V.
(ii) For the optimised flow field design (i.e. 14-channels serpentine flow field), as the channel depth
decreases from 0.8 mm to 0.25 mm, the current density increases up to around 7%. The decrease
in the depth of the channel increases the convective flow in the channels, facilitating the removal
of excess liquid water.
 (iii) As the air flow rate increases, the fuel cell performance improves and this is due to the increased
supply rate of oxygen and increased removal rate of excess water. The current density increases by
about 25% when increasing the air flow rate by a factor of 4.

Acknowledgements
This work was supported by a grant from the Romanian Ministry of Research and Innovation,
CCCDI - UEFISCDI, project no. PN-III-P1-1.2-PCCDI-2017-0194/25 PCCDI within PNCDI III.

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