Computational Modelling and Simulation of Polymer Electrolyte Membrane Fuel Cell with COMSOL

In this study a two-dimensional computational model of a polymer electrolyte fuel cell (PEMFC) was adopted from previous studies and simulated using COMSOL MP v5.2 in order to have a starting point for developing a better representative PEMFC model. Navier-Stokes, Brinkman, Maxwell-Stefan, and Butler-Volmer equations were solved to calculate the flow in the gas channels, the flow in porous layers, the mass transport (diffusion of species), and the current distribution in the model, respectively. The polarization curve was plotted and compared with the experimental data. It was found that the results were in good agreement with the experimental results. Furthermore, the numerical results showed a strong dependence on the mesh quality and type.