Journal of Chemical Engineering of Japan, Vol.37, No.1, 31-39, 2004
Dispersion control of nano-particles and the effect of the coating condition on the performance of proton-exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs)
It is known that the particle characteristics and method of coating affect the performance of the electrode in PEMFC technology. The slurry to be used for the preparation of the PEMFC electrode is the suspension of carbon-supported Pt nano-particles (Pt/C) in a Nafion solution. The agglomeration nature of this slurry is obtained both experimentally and theoretically. Information on slurry dispersion is compared with the cross sectional SEM image of the membrane. It is certified that there exists a good correlation between agglomeration characteristic length and the void diameter observed in SEM images. The evaluation of PEMFC electrode performance is done by using several kinds of electrode membranes prepared under different coading speeds. Slight increases both in cell voltage and internal resistance are observed for the case of cathode performance experiments according to the increase of the coating speed. On the other hand, no effect of the coating speed is detected for the case of anode performance experiments due to the cell voltage results were affected mainly by the electrocatalytic activity of the cathode, which results in no effect of the agglomeration. It is concluded that higher coating speed is preferable to get good PEMFC electrode performance within the range of the present experimental conditions.