Compared to the more common methanol already introduced into the market, higher alcohols like ethanol and ethylene glycol are an attractive alternative fuel for low temperature direct fuel cells. Furthermore, the alkaline environment shows a strong enhancement on the conversion rate of these alcohols. However, the electro-catalysis of higher alcohols is demanding due to the necessity of the C-C bond splitting in order to exploit the maximum energy content out of the fuel.In this contribution, a thorough study of the electro-oxidation of ethanol and ethylene glycol will be presented. In order to get insight into the influencing parameters on adsorption and oxidation mechanisms of the respective alcohols, differential electrochemical mass spectrometry is employed to assess volatile reaction products. Based on these results, the preliminary highlight of this ongoing study will be the presentation of a low temperature alkaline direct alcohol fuel cell stack working on ethylene glycol as fuel.

Investigation of the electro-catalytic oxidation of alcohols in alkaline environment

243rd National Meeting (2012)

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