Manufacturing of Low Cost, Durable Membrane Electrode Assemblies Engineered for Rapid Conditioning

Manufacturing process scalable to fuel cell industry • MEA volumes of at least 500k systems/year. Manufacturing process consistent with achieving • $15/kWe DOE 2015 transportation stack cost target. The product made in the manufacturing process should • be at least as durable as the MEA made in the current process for relevant automotive duty cycling test protocols. The product developed using the new process must • demonstrate power density greater or equal to that of the MEA made by the current process for relevant automotive operating conditions. Product form is designed to be compatible with • high-volume stack assembly processes: 3-layer (3-L) MEA roll-good (anode electrode + membrane + cathode electrode) with separate rolls of gas diffusion media (GDM). The stack break-in time should be reduced to 4 hours • or less.