Gas-water Separator
Hydrogen fuel cell power generation is a clean energy solution because its only byproducts are heat and water, which is low-carbon and environmentally friendly. In hydrogen fuel cells, the water produced by the cathode exhaust needs to be separated from the air to protect the compressor; the water produced on the anode side needs to be separated from the hydrogen return loop to avoid recycling into the fuel cell, thereby flooding the gas diffusion layer and negatively affecting the performance of the stack. The gas-water separator can effectively remove the water produced by the fuel cell, thereby protecting the compressor on the cathode side and the fuel cell on the anode side.
Different types of separators
Gravity Settling Separator
The gravity settling separator is a device that uses the difference in gravity of gas fluid and liquid fluid for separation. The structure of the gravity separator is relatively simple. However, gravity separators are generally larger in size, and the equipment volume needs to be reduced by optimizing the geometry. Moreover, the performance of gas–water separation is related to the working conditions, especially the inlet velocity.
Corrugated Plate Separator
The corrugated plate separator is composed of several corrugated plates. When the gas–liquid mixture passes between the plates, the liquid can impact and stay on the surface of the plate. The advantage of the corrugated plate separator is to handle a large flow rate of gas–liquid mixture with a low pressure drop. However, the separation efficiency of small droplets is not high. The research showed that due to the fragmentation, collision, deflection, and impact of liquid in the flow channel, the large droplets would break, and the number of droplets could increase.
Cyclone Separator
The cyclone separatoris a device that achieves gas–liquid separation by centrifugal force. Although the structure of the cyclone separator is very simple, the flow inside it is very complicated, such as the vortex and unstable flow phenomenon. The operating parameters such as inlet flow rate and liquid fraction also affect the separation performance. Consequently, although the structure of the cyclone separator is relatively simple, its optimal design is challengeable.
Swirl Tube
The swirl tube is also called an axial flow cyclone, a kind of separator employing swirl vanes to convert axial flow into rotational motion. The performance of the swirl tube is mainly affected by the structure of the swirl vane. For example, the study of showed that the multi swirl vanes could increase the tangential velocity of the cyclone, thereby improving the separation efficiency of the cyclone.
Filter Separator
The core of the filter separator is a filter element with a porous structure. The construction of the filter element and the type of material can affect separation performance. Studied filters with different structures, including blade type, wire mesh type, and honeycomb type. The results showed that metal meshdust collectors were superior to other types.
Performance comparison of different types of separators
Taobao Store QR Code
