Research Progress on Advanced Carbon Materials as Pt Support for Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells

Abstract

Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell (PEMFC) has the characteristics of high energy conversion efficiency, high power density, fast start-up at room temperature, low noise and zero pollution, which is expected to alleviate the energy crisis and reduce carbon dioxide emissions. It has broad application prospects in rail transit, aerospace and other fields. Catalyst is one of the key materials of PEMFC. Moreover, Pt catalysts are widely used and considered difficult to be replaced because of their good activity and stability in oxygen reduction reaction. Pt is expensive because of its limited storage. However, Pt loading could be significantly lessened by Pt support to improve PEMFC utilization. Carbon materials are widely used as Pt supports because of their low cost, high specific surface area, pore structure, adjustable conductivity and surface properties, but commercial carbon black supports have low utilization efficiency and poor electrochemical corrosion resistance for Pt. For realizing the large-scale application of PEMFC, it is necessary to develop new carbon supports which can uniformly disperse Pt, efficiently utilize Pt, be resistant to electrochemical corrosion, and have good conductivity, thus the performance and sustainability of PEMFC are improved. Carbon aerogels, carbon nanotubes, graphene and other new carbon supports with unique structures and properties, which are expected to improve PEMFC performance and life, have attracted the attention of many researchers. In this paper, the research progress on new carbon material as Pt support for PEMFC in recent years is reviewed systematically, and the development trend is also commented appropriately.