Recent advances in multi-scale design and construction of materials for direct methanol fuel cells

By Zhangxun Xia, Xiaomin Zhang, Hai Sun, Suli Wang, Gongquan Sun. Nano Energy, 2019

233 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Abstract As one of the substitute power sources with low environmental impact and high energy density, direct methanol fuel cells (DMFCs) show great potentials in applications of portable devices, automobiles, and stationary power plants for the easy handling of liquid fuel. Challenges hindering the further commercialization of DMFCs rely on different fundamental and engineering aspects, including sluggish methanol electrochemical oxidation, methanol crossover, cathode flooding, and massive noble metal use. Herein this review, strategies addressing these issues reported in recent years are focused on the discussion of their advantages in material and structural designs, with emphasis on catalysts, membrane, electrode architecture, and flow field in multiscale consideration. By reviewing the intensively studied materials and structures for DMFC application, a holistic picture of the key component design is sketched. The future development and perspective of DMFCs in the material aspect is also discussed.

Subfields: Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Renewable Energy, Sustainability and the Environment

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/b7aa2bd0b0e0a0e20cf6b1937d37455f7e05f295