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Ionomer-free and recyclable porous-transport electrode for high-performing proton-exchange-membrane water electrolysis

Clean hydrogen production requires large-scale deployment of water-electrolysis technologies, particularly proton-exchange-membrane water electrolyzers (PEMWEs). However, as iridium-based electrocatalysts remain the only practical option for PEMWEs, their low abundance will become a bottleneck for a...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Lee, Jason K., Anderson, Grace, Tricker, Andrew W., Babbe, Finn, Madan, Arya, Cullen, David A., Arregui-Mena, José’ D., Danilovic, Nemanja, Mukundan, Rangachary, Weber, Adam Z., Peng, Xiong
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Nature Publishing Group UK 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10390546/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37524721
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-40375-x
Descripción
Sumario:Clean hydrogen production requires large-scale deployment of water-electrolysis technologies, particularly proton-exchange-membrane water electrolyzers (PEMWEs). However, as iridium-based electrocatalysts remain the only practical option for PEMWEs, their low abundance will become a bottleneck for a sustainable hydrogen economy. Herein, we propose high-performing and durable ionomer-free porous transport electrodes (PTEs) with facile recycling features enabling Ir thrifting and reclamation. The ionomer-free porous transport electrodes offer a practical pathway to investigate the role of ionomer in the catalyst layer and, from microelectrode measurements, point to an ionomer poisoning effect for the oxygen evolution reaction. The ionomer-free porous transport electrodes demonstrate a voltage reduction of > 600 mV compared to conventional ionomer-coated porous transport electrodes at 1.8 A cm(−2) and <0.1 mg(Ir) cm(−2), and a voltage degradation of 29 mV at average rate of 0.58 mV per 1000-cycles after 50k cycles of accelerated-stress tests at 4 A cm(−2). Moreover, the ionomer-free feature enables facile recycling of multiple components of PEMWEs, which is critical to a circular clean hydrogen economy.