High-Temperature Synthesis of PtCo Nanoparticles Supported on a Nitrogen-Doped Carbon Carrier as a Catalyst for the Oxygen Reduction Reaction

Abstract

This work presents a promising method for synthesizing high-performance PtCo/C–N catalysts based on Pt/C material on an N-doped carbon carrier. The effect of treatment temperature of Pt/C–N materials with deposited cobalt precursors on the structure and catalytic activity of PtCo/C–N catalysts has been studied. It was found that an increase in the treatment temperature from 600 to 800 °C leads to a slight growth in nanoparticle size from 2.2 to 2.6 nm (according to XRD) and a decrease in the electrochemical surface area from 90 to 69 m2/g(Pt). After high-temperature synthesis, the activity of the resulting bimetallic PtCo/C–N catalysts is 3–4 times higher than that of the initial Pt/C–N material or the commercial Pt/C benchmark in the potential range of 0.95–0.87 V. The PtCo/C–N material after treatment at 600 °C demonstrated the highest oxygen reduction reaction activity after accelerated stress testing. The obtained PtCo/C–N catalysts are promising materials for the further optimization of the membrane electrode assembly (MEA) catalyst layer and for investigating their long-term stability in MEAs to assess their potential for use in commercial proton-exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs).