Designing new renewable nano-structured electrode and membrane materials for direct alkaline ethanol fuel cell - NanoElMem

Project summary

The increased demand for energy, coupled with concerns about environmental pollution and growing fossil fuel costs have created a great need for clean and efficient power sources. Fuel cells directly convert chemical energy stored in fuels into electrical energy through electrochemical reactions, and have been identified as one of the most promising technologies for the clean energy industry of the future. The overall concept of the NanoElMem project relates to developing novel stable and highly effective materials for the direct alkaline ethanol fuel cell (DAEFC), which directly converts ethanol to electric power. The enhancement of the performance of DAEFCs is based on the development of platinum (Pt)-free electrode catalysts and nano-composite membranes by using environmental-friendly inorganic and polysaccharide materials and technologies. The enormous technical and scientific potential of graphene will be explored in producing of new graphene-polysaccharide membranes.