Speaker
Description
The climate crisis represents one of the most pressing and intricate challenges humanity faces in the modern era. The effects of rising global temperatures are already evident and cannot be ignored. There is widespread agreement that the most effective approach to mitigating global warming and its consequences is a significant and immediate reduction in greenhouse gas emissions worldwide. In this effort, renewable energy sources are pivotal, with green hydrogen energy storage playing a key role as a powerful carbon-neutral energy source. Proton Exchange Membrane Water Electrolysis (PEMWE) emerges as a promising technology for producing high-purity hydrogen. It offers several advantages, including high efficiency, flexibility in adapting to dynamic electrical loads, and the ability to operate under high current densities and pressures.
This work presents a comprehensive framework aimed at capturing the complex multi-physical phenomena occurring within the membranes of PEMWE cells. The most efficient solid electrolyte for water electrolysis is Nafion, a perfluorinated sulfonic acid with sulfonic acid groups that are covalently bounded to a polymer matrix. These polar functional groups enable the membrane to absorb water, resulting in the nanoscale segregation of the polymeric matrix from the water-filled channels forming a porous structure. In the aqueous phase, the dissociated protons are free to move, facilitating ionic conductivity, while the fixed anions in the membrane structure do not contribute to this conductivity.
The proposed framework is based on the theory of porous media (TPM), traditionally valid for immiscible phases, extended by the Theory of Mixtures (TM) that includes single or multiple dissolved solutes or mobile ions in electrodynamics. This approach is found to be robust for modeling the strongly coupled interactions that take place within PEMWE systems, including the mechanical behavior of the Nafion polymeric material, water transport and pressure within the membrane's nanopores and proton diffusion driven by concentration and electric potential gradients. These factors are essential for understanding and optimizing the performance of PEMWE systems.
REFERENCES:
[1] Antonini A, Heider Y, Xotta G, Salomoni V, Aldakheel F (2025) Computational multi-physic modeling of membranes in proton exchange membrane water electrolyzers. “Submitted”
[2] Aldakheel F, Kandekar C, Bensmann B, Dal H, Hanke-Rauschenbach R (2022) Electro-chemo-mechanical induced fracture modeling in proton exchange membrane water electrolysis for sustainable hydrogen production. Comput. Methods Appl. Mech. 400:115580, DOI https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cma.2022.115580
