The overpotentials and inefficient electrochemical reactions are largely responsible for the lowered power density in polymer electrolyte membrane (PEM) based H2/O2 fuel cells. Despite the use of large amounts of expensive precious metals (e.g. Platinum, Pt) the overall efficiency of PEM fuel cells are still about 50% only. The proposed project seeks to build on Entroplus's preliminary results of enhancement in the power density of PEM fuel cells via the use of activated reactants for practical applications. This approach also has the potential to enable the use of non-precious metals or lower amounts of precious metals for lowering the cost of PEM fuel cells. The Phase-I of this project aims to evaluate and demonstrate the technological feasibility for developing the PEM fuel cell and its components for sustained and improved performance using activated reactants.
Keywords: Catalysts, Fuel Cells, Polymer Electrolyte Membrane, Non-Precious Metals.
