Self-Discharge of a Proton Exchange Membrane Electrolyzer: Investigation for Modeling Purposes

Abstract

The self-discharge phenomenon results in a decrease of the open-circuit voltage (OCV), which occurs when an electrochemical device is disconnected from the power source. Although the self-discharge phenomenon has widely been investigated for energy storage devices such as batteries and supercapacitors, no previous works have been reported in the literature about this phenomenon for electrolyzers. For this reason, this work is mainly focused on investigating the self-discharge voltage that occurs in a proton exchange membrane (PEM) electrolyzer. To investigate this voltage drop for modeling purposes, experiments have been performed on a commercial PEM electrolyzer to analyze the decrease in the OCV. One model was developed based on different tests carried out on a commercial-400 W PEM electrolyzer for the self-discharge voltage. The proposed model has been compared with the experimental data to assess its effectiveness in modeling the self-discharge phenomenon. Thus, by taking into account this voltage drop in the modeling, simulations with a higher degree of reliability were obtained when predicting the behavior of PEM electrolyzers.

Investigation of Electrical and Thermal Performance of a Commercial PEM Electrolyzer under Dynamic Solicitations

“…This large voltage range is observed mainly for scenarios relying on falling step currents, where the final value is equal to 0 A. As demonstrated in a previous paper [21], for this specific operating condition at 0 A, the cell voltage converges to 0 V due to the decrease in the open-circuit cell voltage. During the experiments, the variation in the temperature leads to a change in the cell voltage of the PEM electrolyzer, which gathers the reversible voltage, activation, and ohmic overvoltage [22].…”

A Comprehensive Survey of Alkaline Electrolyzer Modeling: Electrical Domain and Specific Electrolyte Conductivity

“…Besides, in [52], a first value of the capacitance has been provided, equal to 15 mF. This value is much lower than those reported for PEM electrolyzers [53]. Indeed, for PEM electrolyzers, capacitance values from 3 to 69 F have been reported according to the operating conditions.…”

Modeling, Degradation Study, Failures Diagnosis and Faulty Operating Management of Electrolyzers

“…Most of the published papers investigated PEM electrolyzers [12,[14][15][16] which confirms the growing interest in this technology to generate hydrogen from RES. Moreover, all the published papers reported experiments performed on electrolyzers that demonstrate the relevance of the papers and the significance of using experimental data for investigation purposes.…”

“…As a result of this Special Issue proposal, five research papers [12][13][14][15][16] from four different countries have been published. Researchers at academic institutions and the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) from France [12,13,15], Mexico [15], Germany [14], and Taiwan [16] contributed to this work. It is important to point out that the research reported in Ref.…”

“…Moreover, all the published papers reported experiments performed on electrolyzers that demonstrate the relevance of the papers and the significance of using experimental data for investigation purposes. Hence, the published papers reported on new contributions compared to the current literature, including an investigation of the effects of current ripple from power electronics on the performance of PEM electrolyzers [12]; the use of X-ray micro-computed tomography to examine the 3D microstructure of the anode-electrolytes of electrolyzers [13]; the development of a mathematical model to evaluate the cell polarization, current density distribution and water flow paths inside a cell under low stoichiometry conditions [14]; the analysis of the decrease in the open-circuit voltage of the PEM electrolyzer during shutdown operation and its modeling [15]; and the application of micro-electro-mechanical systems to monitor, in real-time, the state-of-health of a PEM electrolyzer [16].…”