“…In order to reduce the methanol permeability within the poly-® and Nafion/PVA meric matrix, great efforts have been made to modify Nafion ® or preparing new hybrid cation-exchange membranes containing ionic functionalized inorganic fillers [3,4]. Composite membranes using a wide variety of materials such as Pd alloy [5], polypyrrole [6], polyaniline [7], silica [8], sepiolite [9], SEBS [10], PVA [11,12], etc., have been studied. Although those fillers can provide properties as methanol barriers by increasing tortuosity, the fillers would also have a dual function: (a) enhancement of the water retention and (b) increase of the ion-exchange capacity (IEC) of the membranes, two characteristics which favors the proton conductivity.…”