A Silicon-Based Direct Methanol Micro Fuel Cell

Fabrication and characterization of a silicon microfabricated direct methanol fuel cell (muDMFC) is reported The main characteristics of the device are its capability to work without complex pumping systems, only by capillary pressure, and the fact that its performance is not affected by the device orientation. A simple fabrication process, based in DRIE (deep reactive ion etching), allows to obtain a reliable and low-cost final device. The device consists of two silicon microfabricated plates mounted together with a commercial membrane electrode assembly (MEA). Voltage-current (V-I) and power-current (P-I) curves of the device at different methanol concentration and at different fuel cell orientation have been obtained A maximum power density of 2.65 mW/cm² was obtained with a methanol concentration of 2M. It has been also seen that the change in orientation supposes only a 10% variation in the maximum power density. The results obtained in this work demonstrate the feasibility of the device and give a guideline for design and conditions optimization.