Fabrication of nano-platinum alloy electrocatalysts and their performance in a micro-direct methanol fuel cell
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Fabrication of nano-platinum alloy electrocatalysts and their performance in a micro-direct methanol fuel cell Mehdi Mehrpooya1,a , Farzad Valizadeh1, Reza Askarimoghadam1, Sadegh Sadeghi2 , Fatholah Pourfayaz1, Seyed Ali Mousavi1 1 Department of Renewable Energies and Environment, Faculty of New Sciences and Technologies,
University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran
2 Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Science, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran
Received: 5 March 2020 / Accepted: 13 July 2020 © Società Italiana di Fisica and Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract The main target of this investigation is to propose an effective anodic electrocatalyst for micro-direct methanol fuel cell. For this purpose, five nanostructured metal alloy electrocatalysts including platinum (Pt), ruthenium (Ru) and iron (Fe) are synthesized. The singlewalled and multi-walled carbon nanotubes (SW-CNT and MW-CNT) and graphene (Gr) are employed as the carbon (C) base. First, PtRuFe/SW-CNT, PtRuFe/MW-CNT, PtRuFe/Gr and PtRuFe/C catalysts with a 1:4:5 atomic ratio for Pt, Ru and Fe, respectively, and PtRu/C catalyst with a 1:1 atomic ratio for Pt and Ru, correspondingly, are prepared by the process of improved alcohol recovery. In continuation, the morphology and activity of synthesized nano-electrocatalysts are confirmed and assessed by applying the physical and electrochemical tests. According to the obtained results, PtRuFe/SW-CNT is the most suitable catalyst for methanol oxidation reaction. The outcomes of electrochemical measurements show that PtRuFe/SW-CNT electrocatalyst has the highest activity, mass activity, mass transfer and electrochemical active surface area with respect to methanol oxidation in comparison with the commercial Pt/C and the rest of the synthesized catalysts. Next, two-electrode membrane assembly is fabricated with PtRuFe/SW-CNT and commercial Pt/C electrocatalysts to evaluate the performance of them in micro-direct methanol fuel cell. Based on the obtained polarization curves, by using PtRuFe/SW-CNT instead of commercial Pt/C, the current density in zero-voltage and maximum power density enhance by 48% and 92.3%, respectively.
1 Introduction Because of increasing population of world and energy consumption, fossil fuels cannot be a sustainable and suitable resource for providing the required energy [1]. Also, due to the high amounts of CO2 and NOx emissions by applying fossil fuel power plants, they are very harmful for human health and environment [2]. Utilization of the green resources can be a proper and promising solution in order to overcome environmental concerns. Fuel cells are one of the zero pollution and efficient technologies. Fuel cell is a converter component that converts the chemical energy of fuel into direct electricity by electrochemical reactions [3].
a e-mail: [email protected] (corresponding author)
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