In-plane and through-plane local and average Nusselt numbers in fibrous porous materials with different fiber layer temperatures: Gas diffusion layers for fuel cells

Convective heat transfer inside fibrous gas diffusion layers (GDLs) noticeably impacts the heat and water management of air-cooled polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs). Cutting-edge experiments have recently proved that convective heat transfer inside fibrous GDLs increases their thermal resistances considerably. However, heat transfer coefficients are difficult to measure experimentally or compute numerically for the millions of the tiny pores inside microstructural GDLs. The present study provides robust analytic models for predicting the heat transfer coefficient for both through-plane and in-plane flows inside fibrous media such as GDLs. The model is based on the unit cell approach and the integral method. Closed-form formulas are developed for local and average heat transfer coefficients. The model considers the temperature variations of the fiber layers along the medium thickness while assuming the same temperature for all the fibers in each layer. The model is well verified by COMSOL numerical data for a few pores inside a GDL. The simple, closed-form easy-to-use formulas developed in this study can be readily employed for predicting Nusselt number inside multi layer fibrous porous materials. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.