Available at www.sciencedirect.com journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/he Research of a HySyLab internal standard procedure for single PEMFC Rugiada Cuccaro , Marialaura Lucariello, Andrea Battaglia, Alessandro Graizzaro HySyLab, Environment Park, Via Livorno 60, 10144 Torino, Italy article info Article history: Received 11 February 2008 Received in revised form 1 April 2008 Accepted 1 April 2008 Keywords: PEMFC MEA Test protocol Assembling Polarisation curve abstract In literature there are many articles and documents discussing possible single PEMFC test protocols and some attempts to identify a good procedure to which conform, e.g. ‘‘single cell test protocol’’ (USFCC) or ‘‘PEFC testing procedures’’ (FCTESTNET). The Hydrogen System Laboratory (HySyLab) has identified an internal test protocol for a good PEMFC characterisation. In the paper the procedure is illustrated in all its aspects: the assembly, the conditioning and the characterisation of a single PEMFC through polarisation curves under different conditions of temperature, pressure and relative humidity. Other aspects like internal resistance and pressure drops are studied. The HySyLab procedure permits to obtain reproducible and excellent performances with commercial MEAs and PEMFCs tested in laboratory (2200 mA cm 2 at 0.4 V at 70  C cell temperature, 100%RH, ambient pressure, l air ¼ 2:5 and l H2 ¼ 1:5). & 2008 International Association for Hydrogen Energy. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction The proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) have attracted a lot of attention due to their potential applications as a power source for transportation and portable electronic devices [1,2]. In these years, thanks to the improvement of membranes, catalyst materials and bipolar plates, their commercial value has increased [3–5]. When the experimental work on a fuel cell regards the study of its behaviour, it is necessary to follow an adequate test protocol, in order to be able to compare different cell components in several operative conditions. Two of the most used test protocols are the single cell test protocol (USFCC) [6] and the PEFC testing procedures (FCTESTNET) [7]. The main aim that moved this experimental work was to identify an internal procedure for the complete characterisa- tion of a small PEMFC which could satisfy the working conditions of the laboratory. Therefore in this paper the complete developed test procedure for the cell characterisa- tion is described. This one consists of several steps such as the membrane–electrode assembly (MEA) preparation, the cell components assembling and the cell conditioning in a standard condition. The last step of the low temperature fuel cell characterisation consists in testing its electrochemical performances under various working conditions. The cell performances are measured with a specific test station and then analysed. After a careful literature examination [8–13] and on the base of the acquired experience in this field, this paper has been written, in particular, for those people who start to work for the first time with fuel cells. 2. Experimental 2.1. Experimental setup Experiments were carried out on a 25 cm 2 commercial single cell (Fuel Cell Technologies, Inc., Albuquerque, New Mexico) characterised by two P.O.C.O. graphite plates with triple ARTICLE IN PRESS 0360-3199/$ - see front matter & 2008 International Association for Hydrogen Energy. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.ijhydene.2008.04.016 Corresponding author: Tel.: +39 0112257270; fax: +39 0112257209. E-mail address: rugiada.cuccaro@envipark.com (R. Cuccaro). INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HYDROGEN ENERGY 33 (2008) 3159– 3166