Application of CFD Techniques in the Modelling and Simulation of PBI PEMFC ~ G. Doubek 1 *, E. Robalinho 1 , E. F. Cunha 1 , E. Cekinski 2 , and M. Linardi 1 1 IPEN – Av. Prof. Lineu Prestes, 2242, 05508-000, São Paulo, Brazil 2 IPT – Av. Prof. Almeida Prado, 532, 05508-901, São Paulo, Brazil Received November 29, 2010; accepted February 3, 2011 1 Introduction The need for highly efficient and low emission energy con- version devices has attracted attention towards fuel cells world over. Out of several families of fuel cells, proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEM) are an important class of fuel cells for which the technology is mature enough for practical usage. PEM fuel cells composed by polybenzimida- zole (PBI) doped with phosphoric acid forms a new line of research enabling a higher operational temperature and dis- missing complex humidification systems. The operating tem- perature has an important influence over the PEM fuel cell performance, since its increase improves the reaction rates and mass transfer rates. In addition, at high temperature, CO poisoning can be decreased by reducing chemisorptions of CO [1]. In order to further develop this class of fuel cell a computational model would reduce prototype costs and accelerate future production. The application of computa- tional fluid dynamic (CFD) [2] is a very useful tool to simu- late hydrogen and oxygen fuel cells. The two main fundamental models designed to simulate polymer-electrolyte fuel cells were those of Bernardi and Ver- brugge [3] and Springer et al. [4]. Both of them treat the fuel cell MEA (membrane, diffusion media and catalyst layers) as being isothermal and 1-D. Since 1990s, an increasing number of models have been generated, typically more complex and focused on multidimensional, transient and microscopic effects. Ridge et al. [5] implemented the agglomerated model by the first time, to examine the microstructure of the cathode catalytic layer in more detail. Other CFD models have been published, as Siegel et al. [6] studying the effects of the agglomerate radius and catalyst loading on fuel cell’s perfor- mance [7], showing a good comparison with the experimental data. Nowadays many authors are concerned with high tem- perature PEM (HT-PEM) modelling, as presented in the work of Cheddie et al [8–10], Lobato et al. [11], Shamardina et al. [12], Jiao and Li [13] and Jiao et al. [14]. However, there are still many challenges to overcome in order to obtain a more reliable and accurate model to analyse and predict the HT- PEM fuel cell response. At this work a more refined discussion is done over the traditional model used to simulate the polymeric fuel cell’s response, with the objective of increase its applicability to the PBI PEMFC operating at higher temperatures and with dry feed gases. The numerical results were corroborated by the experimental data. – [ * ] Corresponding author, doubeksi@gmail.com, efcunha@ipen.br, gdoubek@ipen.br Abstract In the present work two 3-D models, for the catalytic layer, were employed in order to simulate the responses of a PBI high temperature polymeric membrane fuel cell. The simu- lations made use of an agglomerate model and a pseudo- homogenous model, both implemented taking into account the temperature influence over their parameters. The overall simulation was performed also as two models, linked by the variable pressure, one for the whole graphite plate simulat- ing the distribution channels, and the other dealing with the MEA and thereof the catalytic layer. A discussion over the two models was done and the experimental results demon- strated that the pseudo-homogeneous obtained the better fits. Keywords: CFD, High temperature fuel cell, Modelling, PBI – ~ Paper presented at the Second CARISMA International Conference “Progress in MEA Materials for Medium and High Temperature Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cells”, La Grande Motte, France, 19–22 September 2010. FUEL CELLS 00, 0000, No. 0, 1–11 © 2011 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim 1 ORIGINAL RESEARCH PAPER DOI: 10.1002/fuce.201000179