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Recent advance in direct ethanol fuel cell for sustainable energy production

L An The ,Hong Kong Polytechnic University, China

Direct ethanol fuel cells (DEFC), which promise to be a clean and efficient energy production technology, have recently attracted worldwide attention, primarily because ethanol is a carbon-neutral, sustainable fuel and possesses many unique physicochemical properties including high energy density and ease of transportation, storage as well as handling. However, conventional DEFCs, which use acid proton exchange membranes and precious metal catalysts, result in rather low performance. In our research, we use alkaline anion exchange membranes as the solid electrolyte in DEFCs. It is demonstrated that the change from the acid membrane to an alkaline one leads to a significant performance boost. Recent developments into technology of proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFC) now allow serious consideration to be given to a direct alcohol fuel cell (DAFC) based on a PEMFC, in which alcohol is used directly as the fuel. This is particularly advantageous for mobile applications, since this will avoid the use of a bulky and expensive reformer.