Physicochemical properties of microcrystalline cellulose doped imidazole membrane for direct methanol fuel cell

Abstract

Energy consumption is estimated to increase until 2040 mainly in fossil fuels usage as energy source. Fossil fuels give negative impacts in human’s health and environment due to air pollution as the result of combustion. Fuel cell is the one of many alternatives to produce cleaner energy. Nafion is the membrane based perflourosulfonic acid which is still used as commercial electrolyte membrane for fuel cell. There are several drawbacks that belongs to the nafion membrane such as high methanol permeability and methanol uptake. The application of biomaterial microcrystalline cellulose (MC) and the addition of imidazole (Im) are expected to diminish methanol permeability and increasing the water uptake of the membrane. In this research, some composite of MC membrane’s performances will be determined The composite membrane of MC/Im was fabricated via phase inversion method using 5 wt.% H2SO4 coagulation bath then some other composite membranes was immersed in 2 wt.% phosphotungstic acid (PTA) solution. The lowest methanol permeability and methanol uptake is obtained by MC/Im membrane with 4,67×10−7 cm2.s−1 and 3.19%, respectively. The water uptake of MC/Im achieves 45.52% which is higher than MC, MC/PTA, and MC/Im/PTA at 35.94%, 41.75%, and 45.40%, respectively. Based on the MC/Im properties, the MC/Im membrane is a promising composite membrane for DMFC.