Stability of Bipolar Plate Materials for Proton‐Exchange Membrane Water Electrolyzers: Dissolution of Titanium and Stainless Steel in DI Water and Highly Diluted Acid

Abstract

AbstractThe widespread use of proton exchange membrane water electrolyzers (PEMWE) is hindered by their high cost, of which a colossal factor is caused by the bipolar plates (BPP). In this paper, we investigate the stability of two BPP materials on‐line with an optimized scanning flow cell setup coupled to an inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometer (SFC‐ICP‐MS), as well as scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The stability of currently used titanium and a cheaper alternative, stainless steel (SS) 316L, were characterized in deionized (DI) water and 0.5 mM H2SO4 to mimic the conditions at the BPP under operation. We show that the dissolution of Ti is negligible, whereas SS 316L degrades notably. Here, besides pH, the applied potentials play a crucial role. Nonetheless, even for the highest measured dissolution rate of SS 316L, the contamination in a full cell is estimated to remain below 1 ppm. This work illustrates the capabilities of on‐line high‐throughput stability tests for BPP materials and could therefore contribute towards optimization of cost‐effective PEMWE.