Fundamental Aspects of Direct Liquid-Alcohol Fuel Cells

直接醇燃料电池（DAFC），特别是直接乙醇燃料电池（DEFC）是用于便携式电源的有吸引力的系统，因为这些系统可以设计得相对简单，操作时间长，并且燃料可以容易地由生物质生产。然而，设计一个有效的直接乙醇燃料电池的基本问题必须解决：直接乙醇燃料电池的主要问题是缺乏合适的电催化剂和专门定制的气体扩散电极的阳极和阴极电极。在阳极，必须了解反应机理和动力学，并最终加速反应，以最大限度地减少电池的损耗。此外，必须避免形成降低电池效率和使电池操作复杂化的有毒中间体。在阴极，需要对氧还原成水具有选择性的乙醇不敏感催化剂。该项目旨在基于直接乙醇和直接乙二醇燃料电池的基本方法，以及获得基本的机理见解，得出解决这些问题的策略。

Direct alcohol fuel cells (DAFCs) and specifically the direct ethanol fuel cells (DEFCs) are attractive systems for portable power sources since these systems can be designed comparatively simple, the operating times are extensive and the fuels can easily be produced from biomass. However, fundamental issues for designing an efficient direct ethanol fuel cell have to be addressed: A major problem of direct ethanol fuel cells is the lack of suitable electrocatalysts and specifically tailored gas diffusion electrodes for both anode and cathode electrodes. At the anode, the reaction mechanism and kinetics have to be understood and eventually accelerated to minimize the loss of the cell. Furthermore the formation of poisonous intermediates that lower the cell efficiency and complicate the handling of the cell has to be avoided. At the cathode, ethanol insensitive catalysts which are selective for the reduction of oxygen to water are required. The project aims at deriving strategies to solve these problems based on a fundamental approach for direct ethanol and direct ethylene glycol fuel cells as well as to obtain fundamental mechanistic insights.