Spots in the PEM Fuel Cell Anode

So far in this chapter, the problems have been studied assuming that the catalyst layers on both sides of the cell are not destroyed and, therefore, nonuniformity is caused by in-plane gradient of the fuel concentration in the anode. What happens if a spot in the anode catalyst is dead for the fuel oxidation reaction This may happen if the anode catalyst is locally poisoned by CO molecules, or if it suffers from agglomeration of Pt particles. Similar situations arise when, in one of the electrodes, the catalyst is deliberately removed in a small spot to provide a non-Pt window for the transmission x-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) of another electrode (Roth et al., 2005). 

This section considers a circular dead spot in the anode catalyst layer of a PEM fuel cell and solves a problem for the distribution of potentials and currents in and around the spot (Kulikovsky, 2013b). The spot is modeled as a circular domain with many orders of magnitude lower exchange current density of the HOR, which mimics much lower catalyst active surface. 

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Kulikovsky, A. A. 2013b. Dead spot in the PEM fuel cell anode. 160,... 

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