Accelerated stress tests oriented load profile for PEM Fuel Cells durability in automotive applications

Proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) appear nowadays to be promising devices to face energy transition challenges in automotive applications. Nevertheless, the impact of the dynamic operations on their durability represents the main constraint for FC electric vehicles (FCEV) deployment. As a consequence, research and industry mainly focus on the ageing characterization of stack components, aiming at system lifetime prediction and enhancement. In this framework, to reduce test duration and costs, developing suited accelerated stress test (AST) procedures is the main challenge. To this purpose a new procedure able to accelerate the real ageing induced by driving cycle operations is investigated. In this paper the effects of load variations and start and stop conditions are presented. The aim of this work is to observe the lifetime dependence on load profile amplitude and frequency (dynamics) in order to deduce basic rules to develop ad-hoc AST procedures. The presented methodology is based on mixed load cycling and on produced energy conservation.