Investigation on a novel model of PEMFC stack integrated with micro heat pipe arrays and multi-objective optimization

Based on the novel proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFC) stack integrated with highly thermal conductive micro heat pipe arrays (MHPA), a method that combines mathematical modeling, experiment, and multi-objective optimization is designed in this paper. The mathematical model adopts lumped parameter coupled with water, thermal, electricity, and other sub-models, which is used to investigate the performance of the MHPA-PEMFC stack, and is further combined with the response surface method to develop a multi-objective joint optimization strategy and predictive models for the structure of the stack. Results show that the performance of the stack at low ambient temperature is better when the stack is under high currents. The maximum loading currents and maximum power density improvement effects of increasing the number of MHPA are much less than the disadvantages brought by increasing the weight. The optimization results suggest that for each 1 kW of the stack, the optimum configuration is as follows: The numbers of MHPAs and fin groups are 30 and 10, respectively, and the length of MHPA condensation is 75.7 mm. The maximum net power under typical load (30 A) can be increased by 17.7 %, and the stack weight can be reduced by 1083.5 g after optimization.