Abstract

Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) have been investigated in recent years as a catalyst support for proton exchange membrane fuel cells. Improved catalyst activities were observed and attributed to metal-support interactions. We report a study on the kinetics of methanol electro-oxidation on CNT supported Pt-Ru alloy nanoparticles. Alloy catalysts with different compositions, Pt 53Ru 47/CNT, Pt 69Ru 31/CNT and Pt 77Ru 23/CNT, were prepared and investigated in detail. Experiments were conducted at various temperatures, electrode potentials, and methanol concentrations. It was found that the reaction order of methanol electro-oxidation on the PtRu/CNT catalysts was consistent with what has been reported for PtRu alloys with a value of 0.5 in methanol concentrations. However, the electro-oxidation reaction on the PtRu/CNT catalysts displayed much lower activation energies than that on the Pt-Ru alloy catalysts unsupported or supported on carbon black (PtRu/CB). This study provides an overall kinetic evaluation of the PtRu/CNT catalysts and further demonstrates the beneficial role of CNTs.

Department(s)

Chemical and Biochemical Engineering

Publication Status

Open Access

Comments

Directorate for Engineering, Grant 0522931

Keywords and Phrases

Carbon nanotubes; Fuel cells; Methanol electro-oxidation; PtRu catalysts

International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)

1996-1073

Document Type

Article - Journal

Document Version

Final Version

File Type

text

Language(s)

English

Rights

© 2024 The Authors, All rights reserved.

Creative Commons Licensing

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Publication Date

01 Sep 2009

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