The feasibility of a fuel cell/phase change/thermoelectric system for free swimming diver thermal protection

The feasibility of a conceptual portable diver heating system (DHS) powered by a proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) that could heat or cool a diver with circulating water was investigated in this thesis. The major components of this DHS are a water-cooled PEMFC, a thermoelectric cooler (TEC) with dual heating/cooling modes, and a double-pipe heat exchanger with phase change material (PCM) stored in its annulus. An air-cooled PEMFC and the double-pipe heat exchanger containing PCM were examined separately to better understand how the components of a conceptual DHS would interact.; The interaction of heat, electricity, and other forms of energy were assessed by applying the First Law of Thermodynamics (or energy balance) to experimental data of a 200 W air-cooled PEMFC tested at various loads. The PEMFC was fitted with instrumentation to determine thermodynamic states at each inlet/exit and modified to capture waste heat and purged fluids. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)...