Investigations of Pulse and Continuous Water Electrolysis by Taguchi Method

Abstract

This study applied the Taguchi method to investigate the effects of two sets of designed factors on water electrolysis. The first set is primarily used to determine the pulse current effect on water electrolysis. The second set is to determine the effects of electrolysis time, current density, electrolyte concentration and electrode space on continuous water electrolysis. Results of pulse water electrolysis show that the effect of pulse current on water electrolysis is small, which is verified and confirmed by quantitative experiments. In both studies, the current density and electrolyte concentration play the most important role on water electrolysis among the designed factors. They together contribute about 70% on water electrolysis. Results of continuous water electrolysis show that, as expected, the smaller the current density and electrode space, and the larger the electrolyte concentration is, the smaller the applied voltage is. Nevertheless, the decrement of applied voltage is small as the electrolyte concentration is higher than 5%.