Lifetime is one of the important indicators of automotive proton exchange membrane fuel cells. People used to evaluate the lifetime of vehicular fuel cells by laboratory tests or road tests that usually take thousands hours even years. In order to achieve a rapid evaluation technique and to seek lifetime extension methods, a lifetime calculation formation was drawn out in consideration of the vehicle driving cycle and the working condition factors. Bench experiments were individually carried out on two fuel-cell stacks same as ones applied on vehicle, and the performance decay rates of the two stacks were obtained under four operation conditions of changing load cycle, start-stop cycle, idling and heavy load. As a result, the predicted lifetimes rather conform to the actual running status in road test. And the research on the fuel cell performance decay rates under different load conditions was also done. Consequently, an unexpected finding was discovered that operating under micro-current has an effect on recovering fuel cell performance. The vehicle fuel cell rapid assessment method only requires four laboratory tests of driving cycle, load cycle, idle operating conditions and heavy load conditions, and the whole process merely lasts less than 250 h. These experimental results can be used to predict the vehicular fuel cell lifetimes on various utility models or driving cycles, therefore to optimize the application model to prolong the fuel cell lifetime. Actually in the experiment, it has already been proved successfully that the fuel cell lifetime could be extended from 1 100 h to 2 600 h by optimizing operating mode. The quick evaluation method is helpful to develop extended life fuel cell and to deplete fuel cell for a longer time.
