Development of alkaline direct methanol fuel cells based on crosslinked PVA polymer membranes

A novel crosslinked PVA/SSA (10 wt.% sulfosuccinic acid) solid polymer membrane was obtained by a solution casting technique. An alkaline direct methanol fuel cell (DMFC) is composed of an air cathode with a mixture of MnO2/BP2000 + CNT binary carbon inks, a Ti-based anode electrode with PtRu black inks (varied from 0.25 to 4.50 mg cm−2) and an alkaline crosslinked PVA/SSA solid polymer membrane. The electrochemical characteristics of the anode and cathode electrodes were investigated by the linear polarization method, cyclic voltammetry (CV) analysis, potentiostatic method and AC impedance spectroscopy. A Ti-mesh (Delker) with a thickness of 0.1 mm was used as a current collector on the anode electrode without a diffusion layer, which greatly reduced the mass transfer resistance for the electrode reaction. It was demonstrated that the alkaline DMFC using this novel crosslinked PVA/SSA solid polymer membrane showed excellent electrochemical performance at ambient temperature and pressure. The maximum peak current density of the DMFC was about 4.13 mW cm−2 at 60 °C and 1 atm in 2 M KOH + 2 M CH3OH solution.