Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha

Ryoichi Namba

Tomotaka Ishikawa

Shigeki Hasegawa

Masahiro Imanishi

Shigeaki Murata

Yoshikatsu Fujimura

Yusuke Katayama

A fuel cell system includes a cathode gas supply passage through which cathode gas is supplied to the fuel cell stack, a cathode gas discharge passage through which the cathode gas is discharged from the fuel cell stack, a turbo compressor provided in the cathode gas supply passage for delivering the cathode gas to the fuel cell stack, a valve provided in the cathode gas supply passage or the cathode gas discharge passage, and a controller that controls constituent components of the fuel cell system including the turbo compressor and the valve. The controller performs cathode-gas flow rate change control to alternately open and close the valve, in a condition where the turbo compressor is driven, when the fuel cell stack is not required to generate electric power.

Fuel cell system and method of controlling the same

A controller of a fuel cell system performs cathode gas supply control to raise an average cell voltage of a fuel cell stack by increasing supply of cathode gas to the fuel cell stack, when electric power required to be generated by the fuel cell stack is equal to zero, and the average cell voltage is lower than a predetermined target voltage. Under the cathode gas supply control, the controller sets the target voltage when a predetermined condition indicating that crossleak is likely to occur is satisfied, to a value higher than a reference target voltage as the target voltage in the case where the condition is not satisfied.

A fuel cell system includes a fuel cell stack, a compressor that supplies cathode gas to the fuel cell stack, and a controller that controls constituent components of the fuel cell system including the compressor. The controller controls the compressor, such that a supply period in which the compressor supplies the cathode gas and a stop period in which supply of the cathode gas is stopped appear alternately, when the fuel cell stack is not required to generate electric power, and the supply period is longer than the stop period, and such that the flow rate of the cathode gas supplied by the compressor in the supply period is smaller than the flow rate in the case where the fuel cell stack is required to generate electric power.

This electrode for fuel cell comprises: carbon nanotubes; a catalyst for fuel cell supported on the carbon nanotubes; and an ionomer provided to coat the carbon nanotubes and the catalyst for fuel cell, wherein when a length of the carbon nanotubes is represented by La [&#x3bc;m] and an inter-core pitch of the carbon nanotubes is represented by Pa [nm], the length La and the inter-core pitch Pa satisfy two expressions given below: 30&#x2266;La&#x2266;240; and 0.351&#xd7;La+75&#x2266;Pa&#x2266;250.

Electrode for fuel cell and production method of electrode for fuel cell, membrane electrode assembly and fuel cell

Disclosed is a method for producing ionomer-coated, catalyst-supporting carbon nanotubes, the method comprising: a step of preparing catalyst-supporting carbon nanotubes on at least one surface of a substrate; a step of preparing a first ionomer solution; an ionomer coating step of bringing the catalyst-supporting carbon nanotubes into contact with the first ionomer solution and coating the catalyst-supporting carbon nanotubes with the ionomer; and a drying step of drying the ionomer-coated, catalyst-supporting carbon nanotubes, wherein the method comprises an ionomer removal step in which, when the ionomer that is unevenly attached in a thickness direction of a layer comprising the ionomer-coated, catalyst-supporting carbon nanotubes, the ionomer that is relatively largely found in and attached to the tip end of the carbon nanotubes rather than other parts thereof, is removed after the ionomer coating step and before the drying step.

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Okazaki, Japan

Ryoichi Namba