Fuel cell devices are currently being investigated for a variety of stationary and portable power applications as they efficiently convert the chemical energy stored in a fuel (e.g, H2 or CH3OH) into electrical energy. One type of fuel cell that has been investigated extensively is the polymer exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC). These PEMFC's operate at relatively low temperatures (60 to 100 �C) with high efficiency and consist of a polymeric material pressed between the cathode and anode to facilitate ion conduction and provide electrical insulation. Fuel cells operated under acidic conditions commonly employ Nafion, a commercial, perfluorinated polymer with pendant sulfonic acid groups, to facilitate the flow of H+ ions. Unfortunately, the oxygen reduction reaction is rate limiting for acidic fuel cells and the most commonly employed cathode materials are based on platinum. As platinum is an expensive and scarce noble metal, investigation into fuel cells operated under alkaline conditions are drawing interest as the more facile oxygen reduction kinetics allow for other metals such as silver to be employed as the cathode catalyst. Consequently, investigation of various alkaline anion exchange membranes (AAEM's) has attracted interest to find an AAEM equivalent to Nafion. A variety of research to date has focused on several different polymer backbones including polysulfones, poly(phenylene)s,   poly(ether-imide)s, and polytetrafluoroethylene. These polymeric supports are synthesized with pendant ammonium cations to facilitate hydroxide conduction from the cathode to the anode. This presentation will outline our recent synthetic efforts to prepare ionomer electrode materials using ring-opening metathesis polymerization.

Synthesis of ionomer electrode materials for fuel cell applications

243rd National Meeting (2012)

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