Fabr ication of nickel and Pt-Ni particle/c arbon pa per electrocatalysts for el ectrooxi dation of methanol in alkaline medium

The de velopment of alternati ve power so urces is an important issue at pre sent. Fuel cells are attracti ve sources of electrical power sin ce they realize the direct conversion of chemical into electrical energy. Direct methanol fuel cells (DMFC ) are expe cted to be the first fuel cells to provide a power source for portable electronic devices, suchas mob ile phones, laptop computers and advanced m obile electronic devices. Since it requir es little ad ditional equipment compa red to the extensive gas process technology for metha nol reform ing, the fuel is best transp orted and converted into energy from the liq uid state [ ۱, ۲]. Howe ver, the fuel cells could not reach the stage of commercialization due to the high cost which was mainly associated with the n oble. Nowadays, all pre-commercial, low-te mperature fuel cells use su pported Pt and Pt alloys as ele ctro-catalysts. Critical properties to consid er when choosin g an elec tro-catalyst support include it s electrical conducti vity, surfa ce area, microstructure, corrosion resistance and cost. In order to redu ce the amo unt of noble metal loading and also for enhancement of electro-catalyt ic activity of electrodes, there ha ve been considerable efforts to increase the disp ersion of the metal particles on the support. In the present study, we pretreat ed carbon paper and prepared electro-catalysts, a nd then characterized these supporting nickel an d Pt-Ni el ectro-catalysts in order to find o ut better catalysts for DMFC. The elec tro-activity of these electro-catalystsfor the methanol oxidation in alkaline solution s was stud ied by different electrochemistry methods.

کلیدواژه ها:

Nicke l ، Carbon p aper ، Platinum ، Electro-catalysis ، direct methanol fuel ce ll