Nano PtCu binary and PtCuAg ternary alloy catalysts for oxygen reduction reaction in proton exchange membrane fuel cells

In order to decrease the cost and enhance the performance of the cathode catalyst for PEMFC, carbon supported PtCu and PtCuAg alloys with differential Ag content are synthesized by a borohydride chemical reduction. The oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) activity are tested by cyclic voltammetry (CV）and linear sweep voltammograms (LSV) in 0.5 M H2SO4. By comparison with the ORR activities of PtCu/C and a series of PtCuAg/C catalysts with differential metal atomic ratios of Pt:Cu:Ag, the PtCuAg/C catalyst with the atomic ratio on 3:10:1 (marked as PtCuAg/C(3:10:1)) shows the best catalytic activity. For the 200th cycles, the limited current reaches to 3.85 mA cm−2 for PtCuAg/C(3:10:1) with Pt-loading of 9.29 μgPt cm−2. The CV curves of the PtCuAg/C catalysts show one more pair of redox peaks of Ag compared with PtCu/C catalyst, which is much different from Pt-M alloy catalysts reported in other literature. The TEM and XRD as well as XPS results indicate that the enhanced ORR activity is the result of the smaller particle size, the crystal distortion and the more exposure of Pt atoms with the introduction of Ag for PtCuAg/C(3:10:1) catalyst.