Study on high dispersion technology of bifunctional oxygen electrodes in proton exchange membrane unitized regenerative fuel cells

doi:10.19799/j.cnki.2095-4239.2023.0795

Abstract

Abstract:

Proton exchange membrane unitized regenerative fuel cells (PEM-URFCs) are considered to be one of the most ideal energy storage devices. In PEM-URFCs, the processes carried out in a fuel cell and water electrolysis are integrated. Bifunctional oxygen electrodes (BOEs) constitute the core structure of the oxygen reduction reaction and that of the oxygen evolution reaction; this is facilitated by preparing a slurry of Pt and IrO₂ materials. Since dispersing this catalyst slurry is difficult, this results in low catalyst utilization and poor durability. To overcome the above problems, in this study, the dispersion effect and stability of the Pt-IrO₂ slurry were improved by combining the HS-PEG-COOH stabilizer with the interval ultrasonic dispersion process. Subsequently, the BOE was prepared by using this slurry. The experimental results show that the BOE prepared in this study is rich in nanoscale pores, and has a higher catalyst utilization rate and better round-trip efficiency (RTE) than the BOE prepared by the continuous ultrasonic dispersion process. The polarization performance test results show that the RTE of the PEM-URFC assembled by the BOE prepared in this study can reach up to 51.12% under the working condition of 0.5 A/cm2, which is 9% higher than that of reached by the PEM-URFC assembled by the BOE prepared by the continuous ultrasonic dispersion process. Additionally, after 3000 accelerated experiments, it was found that the RTE of the PEM-URFC assembled by the BOE prepared by this study decreased by only 0.249%, which was lower than that of the PEM-URFC assembled by the BOE prepared by the continuous ultrasonic dispersion process by 1.675%. Hence, the proposed method of combining the HS-PEG-COOH stabilizer and interval ultrasonic dispersion technology to improve the dispersion effect of the slurry used to prepare the BOE contributes to the existing knowledge regarding optimizing the preparation process of the BOE.

Key words: proton exchange membrane unitized regenerative fuel cell, bifunctional oxygen electrode, stabilizer, interval ultrasonic dispersion process

CLC Number:

TQ 116.2

Zhonghao ZHANG, Diankai QIU, Linfa PENG, Peiyun YI. Study on high dispersion technology of bifunctional oxygen electrodes in proton exchange membrane unitized regenerative fuel cells[J]. Energy Storage Science and Technology, 2024, 13(5): 1417-1426.

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实验序号	电池分组	浆料分组	分散方式	是否加入稳定剂
1	URFC-O	Ink-O	持续超声	否
2	URFC-A	Ink-A	持续超声	是
3	URFC-B	Ink-B	间隔超声	否
4	URFC-C	Ink-C	间隔超声	是

实验序号	电池分组	ECSA_Pt/(m²/g)	ECSA_IrO2/(m²/g)	孔隙率/%
1	URFC-O	9.85	12.59	33.09
2	URFC-A	13.83	13.72	37.48
3	URFC-B	21.14	19.20	51.09
4	URFC-C	25.33	21.11	59.42