Ordered mesoporous carbon supported fuel cell cathode catalyst for improved oxygen transport

In this study, ordered mesoporous carbon (OMC or CMK-3) was evaluated as a viable carbon support in place of widely used high surface area (HSC or Ketjenblack® EC-300J) and Vulcan supports. The OMC carbon has significant mesoporous (pore diameter from 2 to 5 nm) volume in an ordered fashion thereby enabling improved access of Pt sites to O2 transport. The measured local oxygen transport resistance (R(O2)-local) of Pt supported OMC was quite low (3 s/cm) compared to that of HSC (15.9 s/cm) and Vulcan (8.3 s/cm). Also, Pt/OMC exhibited better beginning of life (BOL) fuel cell performance under H2-Air at 80 °C compared to that of Pt/V and Pt/HSC at high current densities (>1.5 A/cm2). Finally, voltage cycling measurements (30,000 cycles) were done to measure the durability of the electrocatalysts. Both Pt/HSC and Pt/OMC showed comparable fuel cell performance at end of test (EOT) especially at high current densities. In summary, our physical and electrochemical study of Pt/OMC suggest that it could be a potential replacement to the widely used HSC and Vulcan carbon supports.