Fabrication and characterization of metal‐based gas diffusion layer containing <scp>rGO</scp> and graphite for proton exchange membrane fuel cells
Leila Moradizadeh, Mohammad Hossein Paydar, Parima Yazdanpanah, Gholamreza Karimi
Abstract
Proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) offers various advantages such as high power density, high efficiency, low operating temperature, and very short start-up time, which make it a very good candidate to be used in electric vehicles propulsion systems. Among various cell components, the gas diffusion layer (GDL) plays an essential role in the energy conversion of the cell, hence the selection of GDL materials and the fabrication procedure are very important. In the present study, nickel mesh-based double-layer GDL samples containing reduced graphene oxide (rGO) were made and evaluated in terms of various transport properties. The combination of rGO, graphite, and polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) in the form of slurry with suitable viscosity, was screen printed on nickel-mesh and baked to form the final GDL structure. Porosity, permeability, contact angle, roughness, thermal, and electrical conductivity of GDL samples were determined to assess the effect of the various components on the quality of the final product. The results of GDL characterization show that the presence of rGO improves all of the GDL transport properties except the electrical conductivity. PTFE, on the other hand, only has a positive effect on improving contact angle and roughness properties. The characterization results also showed that the fabricated GDL samples can perform better than or are comparable with the commercial Toray carbon paper.