Powder Metallurgy Approaches for Next-Generation Bipolar Plate Materials - PERMEABLE Projects uri icon

researchers

type

  • European Research Project

reference

  • 101023266

date/time interval

  • June 1, 2021 - December 31, 2022

abstract

  • The proposed 24-month fellowship aims to reintegrate the researcher, Dr. Carlos Romero Villarreal, in Europe after 3.5
    years in New Zealand. He will address the feasibility of using powder metallurgy (PM) approaches and coatings to process
    highly efficient, lightweight bipolar plates (BP) for PEM fuel cells (FC) based on porous flow fields. This fellowship will be
    carried out in the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M), in Spain, under the supervision of Professor Elena Gordo Odériz.
    As part of this, the researcher will carry out a 6-month secondment in ArcelorMittal, the world’s leading steel manufacturer,
    under the co-supervision of Dr. Domínguez and Dr. Botas.
    The scientific objective of the proposal is to develop materials for metallic BP based on porous flow fields that have low
    density in order to reduce considerably the weight of PEMFCs while keeping a high performance, to increase the energy
    efficiency of transportation systems. This contributes to key EU and UN objectives like low-carbon and climate-neutral
    economies. The low-density candidate materials are titanium and Ti-based MAX phases, which have good mechanical and
    conductive properties. These materials will be processed using PM techniques that allow the fabrication of dense and porous
    materials. To improve their performance, corrosion-resistant and electrically-conductive coatings based on TiN and
    graphene will be developed. The mechanical, conductive and corrosion properties of these materials will be characterised to
    assess if they achieve the PEMFC target properties.
    Along with the training in the relevant scientific skills, this proposal also has the objective to establish Dr. Romero as an
    independent researcher by training in several transferable skills key for academic and industrial environments such as
    leadership, teaching and supervision, project management, IPR and knowledge transfer and scientific communication
    (especially to non-specialist audiences).

keywords

  • materials engineering; chemical engineering; technical chemistry; fuel cells; graphene; carbon nanotubes; mechanical and manufacturing engineering; titanium; ceramic; powder metallurgy; porous materials; coatings