Development and characterization of covalently cross-linked SPEEK/Cs-TPA/CeO2 composite membrane and membrane electrode assembly for water electrolysis

Solvent Induced Fabrication of Solid Polymer Electrolyte Water Electrolyzer: A study in Sulfonated Poly(Ether Ether Ketone) Based Membrane Electrode Assembly

“…Figure 1a shows the structure of the sPEEK polymer, the proton conductivity is achieved by the sulfonate group in the polymer. The 7 layer MEA was fabricated by the CHP method and a first attempt was made in the fabrication of the MEA in the temperature range of 160 °C–220 °C, around the temperature of Tg (∼200 °C) 9, 11. It was found out that when the fabrication temperature was below 200 °C, poor interfacial contacts were obtained between the electrode and the membrane, resulting in rapid delamination of the MEA upon soaking in water.…”

“…These make SPE water electrolysis (SPEWE) very promising in producing hydrogen as an energy carrier. The currently used commercially available perfluorosulfonate polymer membrane (Nafion, DuPont Co.) suffers from the high cost and decrease in ionic conductivity at temperature above 80 °C 11–13. Therefore, cheaper polymers which are capable of operation at higher temperature (120–180 °) are desired.…”

“…Among the polymer electrolyte membranes being developed, sPEEK has satisfactory electrochemical properties and lower production costs along with other merits such as the excellent thermal and hydrolytic stabilities, high strength and toughness, wear and abrasion resistance of the PEEK 10–12. Up to now, only little efforts have been made in fabricating SPE water electrolysis devices with the sPEEK membrane 13–17. The fabrication technique for the MEA affects the performance of the MEA significantly in terms of contact resistance, triple phase boundary (TPB), electrochemical surface area, and resistance to delamination.…”

“…A typical MEA fabrication technique for SPEWE is the conventional hot‐pressing (CHP) method, in which a proton exchange membrane is sandwiched between the anode and the cathode. The integration of MEA was generally a pressure induced procedure with the hot pressing temperature kept at 20–30 °C above the glass transition temperature (T g ) of the membrane, in which the membrane was softened adequately to ensure its completely integration with the electrode 1, 11. The high Tg for the sPEEK limited the fabrication of the MEA through the CHP method.…”

Composite Polymers Development and Application for Polymer Electrolyte Membrane Technologies—A Review

“…Song. et al [221] prepared a composite membrane including tungstophosphoric acid(TPA) to increase proton conductivity and CeO 2 (Cs) to improve the durability of the membrane into the SPEEK matrix. The composite membrane showed better mechanical and electrochemical properties than Nafion 117 membrane: proton conductivity, tensile strength, and elongation were enhanced.…”