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Phosphorus induced activity-enhancement of Fe-N-C catalysts for high temperature polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells

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Abstract

Fe-N-C materials with atomically dispersed Fe—N4 sites could tolerate the poisoning of phosphate, and is regarded as the most promising alternative to costly Pt-based catalysts for the oxygen reduction in high temperature polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells (HT-PEMFCs). However, they still face the critical issue of insufficient activity in phosphoric acid. Herein, we demonstrate a P-doping strategy to increase the activity of Fe-N-C catalyst via a feasible one-pot method. X-ray absorption spectroscopy and electron microscopy with atomic resolution indicated that the P atom is bonded with the N in Fe—N4 site through C atoms. The as prepared Fe-NCP catalyst shows a half-wave potential of 0.75 V (vs. reversible hydrogen electrode (RHE), 0.1 M H3PO4), which is 60 and 40 mV higher than that of Fe-NC and commercial Pt/C catalysts, respectively. More importantly, the Fe-NCP catalyst could deliver a peak power density of 357 mW·cm−2 in a high temperature fuel cell (160 °C), exceeding the non-noble-metal catalysts ever reported. The enhancement of activity is attributed to the increasing charge density and poisoning tolerance of Fe—N4 caused by neighboring P. This work not only promotes the practical application of Fe-N-C materials in HT-PEMFCs, but also provides a feasible P-doping method for regulating the structure of single atom site.

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Acknowledgements

This work was financially supported by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (No. 2018YFA0702002), the Beijing Natural Science Foundation (No. Z210016), and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 21935001)

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  1. Xiangrong Jin and Yajie Li contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Chemical Resource Engineering, College of Chemistry, Beijing University of Chemical Technology, Beijing, 100029, China

    Xiangrong Jin, Yajie Li, Hao Sun, Xiangxiang Gao, Zhi Lü, Wen Liu & Xiaoming Sun

  2. Engineering Research Center of Advanced Rare Earth Materials, Department of Chemistry, Tsinghua University, Beijing, 100084, China

    Jiazhan Li

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  1. Xiangrong Jin
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Correspondence to Jiazhan Li, Zhi Lü, Wen Liu or Xiaoming Sun.

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Phosphorus induced activity-enhancement of Fe-N-C catalysts for high temperature polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells

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Jin, X., Li, Y., Sun, H. et al. Phosphorus induced activity-enhancement of Fe-N-C catalysts for high temperature polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells. Nano Res. 16, 6531–6536 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-022-5314-2

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