This paper reviews the history of fuel cells. Its follows the path from the invention of the fuel cell up to present days. Fuel cell types as well as their advantages, disadvantages and principal ...applications nowadays are explained. History teaches once again that devices perceived by the public as recent inventions, are actually the product of many years (almost two centuries in this case) of arduous research.
Since its first appearance in 2002, microfluidic fuel cell has received great attention in the past two decades, which is mainly targeted at its use in portable electronics. This micro fuel cell ...technology utilizes microfluidic flows as electrolyte instead of conventional polymer membranes. To date, various fuels have been utilized in it, such as vanadium species, hydrogen, hydrocarbons, hydrogen peroxide, borohydride and nitrogenous materials, each of which has its specific merits and demerits. To optimize its power output and fuel utilization, innovative cell structures and advanced catalysts have been continuously developed for different fuels, with remarkable improvements achieved. The power output can be elevated from several mW cm−2 to several W cm−2 at room temperature, while the fuel utilization per single pass can reach 100% by using 3D flow-through electrodes. Also, investigations in recent years have shown that microfluidic fuel cell stacking increases the working voltage. In addition to cells with plastic channel, novel cell designs based on cellulose paper and fabric materials have also been proposed; apart from being lightweight, they are also free from pumping. These innovative cell designs represent a promising route for achieving real applications in areas such as medical diagnostic, wearable healthcare and smart logistics. As for the conventional plastic cells, they are currently less competitive against batteries and other fuel cells because of the extra pumping requirement, which should be resolved in future by developing passive pumps instead. Alternatively, they can be applied in specific circumstances where the extra pumping loss is tolerable.
•Microfluidic fuel cells with different types of fuels are summarized and compared.•Various flow configurations and electrode structures are reviewed in detail.•Stacking efficiency is compared among different microfluidic fuel cell stacks.•Paper-based and fabric-based microfluidic fuel cells without pumping are introduced.•An outlook on their future development and application is provided.
Hydrogen fuel cell vehicles can complement other electric vehicle technologies as a zero-emission technology and contribute to global efforts to achieve the emission reduction targets. This article ...spotlights the current deployment status of fuel cells in road transport. For this purpose, data collection was performed by the Advanced Fuel Cells Technology Collaboration Programme. Moreover, the available incentives for purchasing a fuel cell vehicle in different countries were reviewed and future perspectives summarized. Based on the collected information, the development trends in the last five years were analyzed and possible further trends that could see the realization of the defined goals derived. The number of registered vehicles was estimated to be 51,437 units, with South Korea leading the market, with 90% of the vehicles being concentrated in four countries. A total of 729 hydrogen refueling stations were in operation, with Japan having the highest number of these. The analysis results clearly indicate a very positive development trend for fuel cell vehicles and hydrogen refueling stations in 2021, with the highest number of new vehicles and stations in a single year, paralleling the year’s overall economic recovery. Yet, a more ambitious ramp-up in the coming years is required to achieve the set targets.
In part A of this review, we have introduced the progress of the research and the application status of unitized regenerative proton exchange membrane fuel cells. In addition to this Proton Exchange ...Membrane (PEM)-based Unitized Regenerative Fuel Cell (URFC), other URFC technologies with different electrolytes have also been reported in the literature, which form the basis for emphasis in this part of the review. Unitized Regenerative Alkaline Fuel Cells (UR-AFC) have long been utilized for aerospace applications, while the recent development of Anion Exchange Membrane (AEM) has stimulated their further development, especially on the AEM-based UR-AFCs. Vast research works have been reported on the bifunctional oxygen catalyst development, while the latest UR-AFC prototypes are also being briefly introduced. Despite their potential cost-efficiency and better reactivity, cell performance and round-trip efficiency of the current UR-AFCs are still lower than their PEM-based counterparts. Unitized regenerative solid oxide fuel cell, which is more commonly cited as Reversible Solid Oxide Fuel Cell (RSOFC), is a high-temperature URFC technology with superior performance and reversibility. Review works conducted on this type of URFC are separated into two categories, that is, RSOFC with oxygen ion conducting electrolyte and RSOFC with proton ion conducting electrolyte. Despite the highest efficiency among various URFC technologies, the application of RSOFCs, however, is restricted by their limited long-term stability and poor cycle ability. Unitized regenerative microfluidic fuel cell, also referred to as the reversible microfluidic fuel cell, is a newly-emerging URFC research trend which benefits a lot from its membraneless configuration. However, limited research works have been conducted on this new technology.
Fuel cells generate electricity and heat during electrochemical reaction which happens between the oxygen and hydrogen to form the water. Fuel cell technology is a promising way to provide energy for ...rural areas where there is no access to the public grid or where there is a huge cost of wiring and transferring electricity. In addition, applications with essential secure electrical energy requirement such as uninterruptible power supplies (UPS), power generation stations and distributed systems can employ fuel cells as their source of energy.
The current paper includes a comparative study of basic design, working principle, applications, advantages and disadvantages of various technologies available for fuel cells. In addition, techno-economic features of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles (FCV) and internal combustion engine vehicles (ICEV) are compared. The results indicate that fuel cell systems have simple design, high reliability, noiseless operation, high efficiency and less environmental impact. The aim of this paper is to serve as a convenient reference for fuel cell power generation reviews.
In the past 10–15 years, the microbial fuel cell (MFC) technology has captured the attention of the scientific community for the possibility of transforming organic waste directly into electricity ...through microbially catalyzed anodic, and microbial/enzymatic/abiotic cathodic electrochemical reactions. In this review, several aspects of the technology are considered. Firstly, a brief history of abiotic to biological fuel cells and subsequently, microbial fuel cells is presented. Secondly, the development of the concept of microbial fuel cell into a wider range of derivative technologies, called bioelectrochemical systems, is described introducing briefly microbial electrolysis cells, microbial desalination cells and microbial electrosynthesis cells. The focus is then shifted to electroactive biofilms and electron transfer mechanisms involved with solid electrodes. Carbonaceous and metallic anode materials are then introduced, followed by an explanation of the electro catalysis of the oxygen reduction reaction and its behavior in neutral media, from recent studies. Cathode catalysts based on carbonaceous, platinum-group metal and platinum-group-metal-free materials are presented, along with membrane materials with a view to future directions. Finally, microbial fuel cell practical implementation, through the utilization of energy output for practical applications, is described.
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•The history of MFCs in the context of bioelectrochemical system is introduced.•Electroactive biofilms and electron transfer mechanisms are described.•Carbonaceous and metallic anode materials are presented.•Cathode catalysts are presented and ORR mechanisms are described.•Utilization of MFC energy output for practical applications is described.
•A reconstructed fuel cell life-prediction model is proposed to simplify the voltage analysis in a fuel cell city bus.•A new classified method is used to define two typical operating conditions to ...analyze the performance degradation.•Compared with traditional method, a better performance degradation prediction is obtained in this study.
Life prediction is a significant and difficult topic for a proton-exchange membrane fuel cell stack, especially a commercial fuel cell stack. This paper proposes a reconstructed fuel cell life-prediction model to estimate the fuel cell lifetime adopted in a city bus. Considering the temperature fluctuation and sensor errors, the voltage model is separated into three parts to simplify the fitting process, and the validation results show that the proposed degradation model is credible and robust. Furthermore, the 14-day training data show that the deviation of the predicted voltage is less than 1%. In this study, the most important innovation is separating the time into different categories. Compared to the traditional method without classification, the proposed model obtains an improved predicted deviation of 50–100%.
A Fuel-Flexible Alkaline Direct Liquid Fuel Cell Tran, K.; Nguyen, T. Q.; Bartrom, A. M. ...
Fuel cells (Weinheim an der Bergstrasse, Germany),
December, 2014, Volume:
14, Issue:
6
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
We constructed a fuel‐flexible fuel cell consisting of an alkaline anion exchange membrane, palladium anode, and platinum cathode. When an alcohol fuel was used with potassium hydroxide added to the ...fuel stream and oxygen was the oxidant, the following maximum power densities were achieved at 60 °C: ethanol (128 mW cm−2), 1‐propanol (101 mW cm−2), 2‐propanol (40 mW cm−2), ethylene glycol (117 mW cm−2), glycerol (78 mW cm−2), and propylene glycol (75 mW cm−2). We also observed a maximum power density of 302 mW cm−2 when potassium formate was used as the fuel under the same conditions. However, when potassium hydroxide was removed from the fuel stream, the maximum power density with ethanol decreased to 9 mW cm−2 (using oxygen as oxidant), while with formate it only decreased to 120 mW cm−2 (using air as the oxidant). Variations in the performance of each fuel are discussed. This fuel‐flexible fuel cell configuration is promising for a number of alcohol fuels. It is especially promising with potassium formate, since it does not require hydroxide added to the fuel stream for efficient operation.
The automotive industry remains one of the most significant contributors to total global emissions worldwide. This growing challenge is primarily attributed to the high dependency on fossil fuel as ...its primary source of energy. This review highlights the current state of the application of fuel cells in the automotive industry, as well as the technological advances made in comparison to the early years of the automotive sector. Future prospects of these technologies are also thoroughly reviewed. Factors impeding the advancement of these technologies while also impeding their commercialization are presented, with possible solutions to this problem also suggested. In summary, this investigation seeks to explore pragamatic approach that can be adopted to reduce the overall cost of fuel cells and their possible integration in the automotive industry.
The hydrogen proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cells are promising to utilize fuel cells in electric vehicle (EV) applications. However, hydrogen PEM fuel cells are still encountering challenges ...regarding their functionality and degradation mechanism. Therefore, this paper aims to study the performance of a 3.2 kW hydrogen PEM fuel cell under accelerated operation conditions, including varying fuel pressure at a level of 0.1–0.5 bar, variable loading, and short-circuit contingencies. We will also present the results on the degradation estimation mechanism of four fuel cells working at different operational conditions, including high-to-low voltage range and high-to-low temperature variations. These experiments examine over 180 days of continuous fuel cell working cycle. We have observed that the drop in the fuel cells' efficiency is at around 7.2% when varying the stack voltage and up to 14.7% when the fuel cell's temperature is not controlled and remained at 95 °C.
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•Performance of 3.2 kW PEM Fuel cell used for EV application is investigated.•The fuel cell output characteristics at short-circuit and purging routines is discussed.•The degradation mechanism of the fuel cell is examined using data captured over 180 days.•A statistical threshold is used to compare and find the probability factor of degradation for the considered fuel cell.
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