Iron-Nitrogen-Carbon Catalysts for Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells

By T. Asset, Plamen Atanassov. 2020

301 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Summary Fuel cell technology is on its verge of deployment as one of the solutions for decarbonization of transportation. It currently uses platinum-based catalysts, being the largest materials cost factor, subject to market volatility, limited availability, and unfavorable geopolitical source location. Hence, Earth-abundant elements-based materials, and among those, platinum-free catalysts, could be an ultimate solution. Among several such catalysts, the transition-metal nitrogen-carbon ones have shown adequate activity and promise in durability, the latest being the most vulnerable treat. Recent years have seen initial successes in incorporation of iron-nitrogen-carbon catalysts in fuel cells and their evaluation under automotive relevant conditions. The catalysts can be described as N-doped, graphene-like carbonaceous materials, with transition metal atomically dispersed and associated with the pyridinic nitrogen-containing in-plane or edge defects in graphene. Here, we provide a view on these materials' chemical composition and morphology that provide for the reactivity and stability of transition-metal-containing active sites.

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

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/f2206a3c578d21e5f9f22ad91c6a9dbe8b46daee