Experimental analysis of the performance of a passive direct alcoholic fuel cell with different alcoholic fuels and blends of methanol-alcoholic additives.

Passive direct methanol fuel cells (DMFC) are most suitable for charging of portable electronic devices. Fuel and oxidant are supplied through diffusion and natural convection processes on the anode and cathode sides of the passive DMFC, respectively. This paper presents the details of experimental studies on the use of different anodic fuels i.e., ethanol, 1-propanol, 2-propanol, methanol in an alcoholic fuel cell. And also, the effect of adding these alcohols as additives to the methanol fuel on the performance of a passive DMFC is presented. For each one of the alcoholic fuels, the concentration of the fuel was varied from 0.5 M to 5 M, and the impact of fuel concentration on the performance of the cell was studied. Similarly, with methanol along with the other alcohol additives as the fuel in the passive DMFC, the additives concentration was varied from 0.5 M to 2.5 M insteps of 0.5 M and the methanol concentration was varied from 1 M to 5 M in steps of 1 M. The experimental results showed that among the anodic alcoholic fuels, 2-propanol generated the peak power density of 4.416 mW cm−2 at 4 M concentration. Similarly, it was also observed that among all the additives, the 2-propanol at 2 M concentration along with methanol at 4 M concentration produced the maximum power density. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]