Experimental research on the dynamic response characteristics of proton exchange membrane fuel cell thermal management using micro-heat pipe array

The dynamic response characteristic is an important performance indicator of the proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC), which has a great influence on the durability and reliability. The cooling capacity is an important factor that affects the stability of the PEMFC output after the change. This research proposes to apply the micro-heat pipe array (MHPA) to the thermal management of PEMFC. A novel MHPA-PEMFC stack is designed, and four cases involving comparative dynamic response experiments are studied. The results show that compared with the traditional air-cooled PEMFC, the MHPA-PEMFC significantly reduces the maximum step voltage, dynamic internal resistance and step temperature, shortens the temperature response time and improves the internal temperature uniformity. In the case where the output current stepped up from 10 to 30 A, the maximum step voltage and the maximum dynamic impedance of MHPA-PEMFC are lower than those of PEMFC by 0.449 V and 0.037 Ω, respectively. The maximum step temperature has been reduced by 4.44 °C, and the temperature response time has been reduced by 180 s. The research results provide a basis for using MHPA in PEMFC thermal management applications.