Panasonic Intellectual Property Management Co., Ltd.

Panasonic Corporation

Panasonic Holdings Corporation

Takashi Kakuwa

Hiromi Kita

Shigenori Onuma

Tomoya Kamata

Kunihiro Ukai

Hideki Nakata

Atsuo Okaichi

Osamu Sakai

Tomohiro Kuroha

Tatsuo Fujita

Masatoshi Nakamura

Takayuki Nakaue

Yukimune Kani

Toshiharu Ooe

Noboru Taniguchi

Toshiharu Otsuka

Osamu Kosuda

Yuichi Mikami

Taiichiro Sakamoto

Masashi Morita

Jin Zhang

Yasushi Kaneko

Takehito Goto

Takeshi Terayama

Kosuke Nunoo

Kyohei Kawada

Takuya Okumura

Naoki Watanabe

Kazuhiro Taniguchi

A compression apparatus includes an electrolyte membrane, an anode provided on a first principal surface of the electrolyte membrane, a cathode provided on a second principal surface of the electrolyte membrane, an anode separator provided on the anode, a cathode separator provided on the cathode, and a voltage applier that applies a voltage between the anode and the cathode. The compression apparatus causes, by using the voltage applier to apply a voltage, protons taken out from a hydrogen-containing gas that is supplied to the anode to move to the cathode via the electrolyte membrane and produces compressed hydrogen. The anode separator has a first flow channel, provided in a principal surface thereof facing away from the anode, through which a cooling fluid flows.

Compression apparatus for hydrogen-containing gas utilizing an anode separator arrangement

An electrochemical device includes an electrolyte membrane, an anode disposed on a first main surface of the electrolyte membrane, a cathode disposed on a second main surface of the electrolyte membrane, an anode separator disposed on the anode, and a cathode separator disposed on the cathode. At least one of the anode separator or the cathode separator includes a metal substrate sheet and a conductive layer disposed on the metal substrate sheet and containing a metal oxide and a metal hydroxide.

Electrochemical device

The compression apparatus includes an electrolyte membrane, an anode on a principal surface of the electrolyte membrane, a cathode on another principal surface of the electrolyte membrane, an anode separator on the anode, a cathode separator on the cathode, and a voltage applicator. Upon the voltage applicator applying the voltage between the anode and the cathode, protons are extracted from an anode fluid fed onto the anode to migrate onto the cathode through the electrolyte membrane and compressed hydrogen is produced. The cathode separator has a first manifold hole and a first O-ring groove surrounding the first manifold hole. The compression apparatus includes a first O-ring held by the first O-ring groove and a face seal disposed on an outer periphery of a region of an anode-side principal surface of the anode separator which faces the anode. The first O-ring is arranged to abut against the anode-side principal surface.

Compression apparatus

A compression apparatus includes a stack of electrochemical cells each including an anode, a cathode, and an electrolyte membrane interposed therebetween, a pair of insulating plates disposed at respective ends of the stack in a stacking direction, a pair of end plates disposed on outside surfaces of the respective insulating plates, and a voltage applicator that applies a voltage between the anode and the cathode. The end plate having the cathode gas channel includes a first region that includes an outer peripheral surface of the cathode gas channel and is composed of a first steel material and a second region other than the first region which is composed of a second steel material. The first steel material has higher hydrogen embrittlement resistance than the second steel material, and the second steel material has higher stiffness than the first steel material.

An electrochemical cell unit according to the present disclosure includes a flat plate type membrane electrode assembly having a structure in which an electrolyte membrane, a first electrode layer disposed on a first surface of the electrolyte membrane, and a second electrode layer disposed on a second surface of the electrolyte membrane are laminated; a first current collector in contact with the first electrode layer of the membrane electrode assembly; an interconnector electrically connected to the first current collector, a second current collector in contact with the second electrode layer of the membrane electrode assembly; and an outer peripheral part made of a metal material that surrounds an outer periphery of the first electrode layer together with the interconnector and the electrolyte membrane to form a gas introduction space for guiding internal gas to the first electrode layer.

Electrochemical cell unit, electrochemical cell stack, method for producing electrochemical cell unit, and method for producing electrochemical cell stack

A compression apparatus includes a stack of electrochemical cells each including an anode, a cathode, and an electrolyte membrane interposed therebetween, a pair of insulating plates disposed at respective ends of the stack in a stacking direction, a pair of first end plates disposed on outside surfaces of the respective insulating plates, and a voltage applicator that applies a voltage between the anode and the cathode. Upon the voltage applicator applying the voltage, the compression apparatus causes hydrogen included in a hydrogen-containing gas fed to the anode to move to the cathode and produces compressed hydrogen. One of the first end plates have a first channel formed therein, through which the hydrogen-containing gas fed to the anode flows, and a second channel formed therein, through which a heating medium flows. The compression apparatus further includes a heater that heats the heating medium.

A compression apparatus includes an electrolyte membrane, an anode on a principal surface of the electrolyte membrane, a cathode on another principal surface of the electrolyte membrane, an anode separator on the anode, a cathode separator on the cathode, and a voltage applicator. Upon the voltage applicator applying a voltage, protons are extracted from an anode fluid fed to the anode to move to the cathode through the electrolyte membrane and compressed hydrogen is produced. The anode separator has a fluid channel, a manifold hole, and a communicating path which are formed in an anode-side principal surface. The compression apparatus includes a face seal disposed on an outer periphery of a region of the anode-side principal surface of the anode separator which faces the anode. The face seal has a three-layer structure including a metal sheet and a pair of elastic sheets.

A compression apparatus includes an electrolyte membrane, an anode on a principal surface of the electrolyte membrane, a cathode on another principal surface of the electrolyte membrane, an anode separator on the anode, a cathode separator on the cathode, and a voltage applicator. Upon the voltage applicator applying a voltage between the anode and the cathode, protons are extracted from an anode fluid fed to the anode to migrate to the cathode through the electrolyte membrane and compressed hydrogen is produced. The cathode separator has a first O-ring groove formed in a cathode-side principal surface of the cathode separator to surround a region of the cathode-side principal surface which faces the cathode. The compression apparatus includes a first O-ring held by the first O-ring groove and a face seal disposed on an outer periphery of a region of an anode-side principal surface of the anode separator which faces the anode.

A solid oxide fuel cell including unit cells, including: a pair of interconnectors for electrically connecting the unit cells; a membrane-electrode assembly including an electrolyte membrane and a pair of electrode layers disposed with the electrolyte membrane therebetween; a pair of current collectors disposed between the electrode layers and the interconnectors so as to be in contact with the pair of electrode layers and the pair of interconnectors, respectively, and electrically connecting the pair of electrode layers and the pair of interconnectors; and elastic bodies biasing at least one current collector of the pair of current collectors toward a corresponding electrode layer and made of austenitic stainless steel.

Solid oxide fuel cell and electrochemical cell

A cell including: a pair of interconnectors for electrically connecting unit cells; a membrane-electrode assembly disposed between the interconnectors; a pair of current collectors, each of which includes an abutting surface abutting against a corresponding one of the electrode layers and a first base material surface being in contact with a corresponding one of the interconnectors and electrically connecting the corresponding of the electrode layers and the corresponding one of the interconnectors; and elastic bodies biasing the abutting surface of at least one current collector toward a corresponding one of the electrode layers. The elastic bodies includes: a second base material surface being in contact with the first base material surface; and an elastic body protruding portion supporting the abutting surface and protruding from the second base material surface toward the corresponding one of the electrode layers to bias the abutting surface toward the corresponding one of the electrode layers.

A fuel cell system includes: a fuel cell stack including a plurality of cells, each of which has a fuel electrode, an air electrode, and an electrolyte, and performs a power generation by a reaction between a fuel gas and air; a fuel supplier supplying the fuel gas to the fuel electrode; an air supplier supplying the air to the air electrode; a voltage detector detecting the voltage of the fuel cell stack; and a controller stopping the supplying of the fuel gas by the fuel supplier and the supplying of the air by the air supplier when the voltage of the fuel cell stack detected by the voltage detector is decreased to be lower than a threshold voltage after the power generation of the fuel cell stack is stopped.

Fuel cell system and method for operating the same

A fuel cell system includes a fuel cell stack that generates electricity using fuel and oxidant gases, a reformer that produces the fuel gas by reforming a raw material, a raw material feeder that supplies the raw material to the reformer, a combustor that combusts anode off-gas discharged from the anode of the fuel cell stack, and a controller that controls the raw material feeder. The period of a load-following operation in which the power output of the fuel cell stack shifts from a lower level to a higher level, is divided into multiple sub-periods. For each sub-period, a ratio is determined from the increase amounts in the flow rate of the raw material during the sub-period and the length of the sub-period. The controller controls the raw material feeder to make a ratio on the higher output side smaller than another on the lower output side.

Fuel cell system

A SOFC system includes: a fuel cell stack; a reformer; an air supplier: a combustor; and a controller. In a stop control of the above system, the controller calculates an average of ratios of the air to the raw material supplied to the reformer as a first average, in a case in which a molar fraction of a hydrogen component in the anode off-gas is higher than a molar fraction of a raw material component in the anode off-gas, and calculates the average of the ratios of the air to the raw material supplied to the reformer as a second average, in a case in which the molar fraction of the hydrogen component in the anode off-gas is lower than the molar fraction of the raw material component in the anode off-gas. The controller controls the air supplier so that the first average is higher than the second average.

Solid oxide fuel cell system

A solid oxide fuel cell system includes a fuel cell stack that generates electric power through a reaction between a fuel gas and an oxidizing gas; a combustor in which anode and cathode off-gases discharged from the fuel cell stack are burned by diffusion combustion; a temperature sensor that detects temperature of the anode off-gas flowing into the combustor; and a controller. When the system is in at least one of the following states during power generation, the controller instructs the system to perform a power-generation control action for preventing failed combustion reactions: the temperature of the anode off-gas, detected by the temperature sensor, is below a first predetermined temperature for a predetermined continuous period of time; the temperature of the anode off-gas decreases by not less than a predetermined second temperature range during a predetermined period of time.

A fuel cell system includes a fuel cell, and a burner. The burner has anode off-gas apertures and first and second cathode off-gas apertures. In a cross section of the burner at a cutting plane that passes a first cathode off-gas aperture, an anode off-gas aperture, and a second cathode off-gas aperture that are aligned on a straight line when seen in plan view, the first cathode off-gas aperture is provided on one side of the anode off-gas aperture such that a vector of an ejecting direction of cathode off-gas forms a first acute angle with a vector of an ejecting direction of anode off-gas, and the second cathode off-gas aperture is provided on the other side of the anode off-gas aperture such that the vector of the ejecting direction of cathode off-gas forms a second acute angle with the vector of the ejecting direction of anode off-gas.

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Osaka, Japan

Takashi Kakuwa