Patent Application
20060272943
This invention relates to an electrochemical sensor for measuring the concentration of fuel, in particular methanol fuel, in an aqueous solution and for applications with fuel cell systems, such as direct methanol fuel cell (DMFC) systems, using fuels prepared in aqueous solutions. The novel approach involves the use of an asymmetric electrode pair structure to limit fuel diffusion and eliminate interferences of fuel crossover, as well as to ensure complete burning of fuel at anode/membrane interface via electrochemical reactions in both stagnant and flowing conditions. The sensor operates in a manner of a small DMFC, but a small depolarization voltage can also be applied to enhance the sensor output signal.
Membrane fuel cells, particularly direct methanol fuel cells (DMFCs), are regarded as potential mobile and stationary power sources due to high energy density, easy operation and simple fuel supply. However, DMFCs suffer from problems of methanol crossover particularly at high methanol concentrations. When methanol crossovers from the anodic side to the cathodic side, electro oxidation of methanol occurs giving rise to a mixed potential and lowering the cell voltage. In addition, more fuel is consumed in vain. Thus, low methanol concentration (e.g., 1 M) is employed in most DMFCs to eliminate or alleviate such drawbacks.
Unfortunately, low concentration of methanol requires a fuel container with large volume to store and is not desirable for any DMFC system design. To solve this problem, concentrated or pure methanol is used as the fuel source and diluted into lower concentrations suitable for current DMFC operating conditions. Therefore, a methanol sensor is indispensable in a complete DMFC system using high concentrations of methanol as fuel, and development of methanol sensors has become a subject of special interest.
There are several methods that can be used to measure methanol concentrations, including density measurement, refractometry, ultraviolet light absorptivity, etc. Due to practical application considerations, attempts have been focused on fabricating a methanol sensor that is simple in structure, accurate in sensing and easy in operation. In particular, stresses are focused on sensitivity and response time of the sensor. State-of-the-art methanol sensor is a fuel cell-type electrochemical sensor, i.e., the sensor itself is basically a small DMFC. However, such an electrochemical sensor has several designs and operation methods.
For example, Barton et al. in J. Electrochemical Soc., vol. 145, No. 11, pp. 3783-3788, November 1998, reported a methanol sensor in which the membrane electrode assembly (MEA) is exposed to the methanol solution on one side and the methanol flux across the membrane is electro-oxidized at other side of the MEA by applying a high DC voltage (about 1.0 V) across the two electrodes. For this type of sensor, the cathode is exposed to the methanol solution and the cathode reaction is hydrogen evolution. The anode reaction is electro oxidation of the methanol that crossovers the membrane. The use of a high applied DC voltage is apparent a drawback. In Electrochemical and Solid-State Letters, vol. 3, No. 3, pp. 117-120, March 2000, Narayanan et al. described a modification to such a design by circulating the methanol solution through both sides of the MEA and applying a lower voltage (0.45-0.65 V) to avoid dissolution of catalysts, particularly Pt—Ru. However, such a sensor is suggested to apply to only very low concentrations of methanol (<2 M).
Another fuel cell-type methanol sensor has been disclosed by Ren et al. in U.S. Pat. No. 6,488,837, in which the cathode is flow with air and the cathode is fed with methanol and operated in a passive mode, i.e., no external voltage was applied. In other words, the methanol sensor was functioning as a small DMFC. The advantage is a simple design without using additional power sources. However, oxygen or air feeding is still needed and such a design is also limited to low methanol concentrations.
More recently, in U.S. Pat. No. 6,527,943 Zhang et al. have described a fuel cell-based concentration sensor working by decreasing the load across the fuel cell terminals and by increasing the amount of oxidant supplied to the fuel cell. In this way, the sensor can avoid saturation when measuring methanol concentration from 0 M to over 4 M in liquid aqueous solution. The sensor was said to be suitable for a flowing system. Furthermore, in U.S. Pat. No. 6,836,123 Qi et al. disclosed a new sensing device design, which has a flexible composite of layered materials wrapped around a flexible tube having aperture contact with a methanol flow stream. The layered materials wrapped on the tube are, in fact, a set of MEA and current collectors. This is also a fuel cell-type concentration sensor to be used for a flowing system.
In accordance with the present invention, a novel approach is employed to fabricate a novel fuel cell-type electrochemical sensor that uses air in the atmosphere as an oxidant to detect the concentration of fuel, which is prepared in a form of aqueous solution.
Anode CH3OH+H2O→CO2+6H++6e−
Cathode 3/2O2+6H++6e−→3H2O
This applied DC voltage has depolarization effects leading to enhancement of sensor electrochemical reactions and, in turn, sensor current signals. In addition, the sensor can be operated with fuel solution in a stagnant or a flowing condition. Thus, the structure of electrochemical fuel concentration sensor is simpler and the operation is more versatile. The electrochemical sensor is to be used for sensing a variety of fuel solutions in addition to commonly used methanol aqueous solution.
The accompanying drawings serve to explain the principles of the invention and illustrate the embodiments of the present invention. In the drawings:
The heart of the electrochemical sensor, i.e., membrane electrolyte assembly (MEA) 1, is fabricated using a small piece of Nafion® 117 membrane hot pressed with a Pt/C coated cathode 3 and a Pt—Ru/C coated anode 2 on both sides. The catalyst loading for each electrode is 4 mg/cm2 but the anode has a geometric area much smaller than that of the cathode. The MEA is assembled into a fuel cell-type electrochemical sensor using two pieces of graphite plate as the current collectors 4. A hole is drilled at the center of each graphite plate for the introduction of air and fuel solution to the respective electrode. The hole on the cathode side plate 7 has a dimension much larger than that on the anode side plate 8 making the exposed area ratio of anode/cathode of 1/4. This is to ensure that only a small amount of fuel is diffused to the anode/membrane interface and can be totally reacted in conjunction with oxygen reduction at the cathode. The end plates are two pieces of Plexiglas. The cathode end plate has a large hole 9 opening the cathode to air while the anode end plate had a small reservoir 10 coupled with two channels 11 for addition and removal or flowing of fuel solution.
For demonstration of the feasibility and capability of the invented electrochemical sensor, experiments are carried out in an oven by exposing the cathode to ambient atmosphere without real forced circulation of the air. Methanol and other fuels are prepared into aqueous solutions of various concentrations using analytical grade chemical and deionized water (resistivity>16.0 MΩ cm). The transient oxidation current of fuel at each specific concentration is measured using a potentiostat for a period of time until a steady state is reached. A corresponding calibration curve of steady state oxidation current versus methanol concentration is then constructed. The sensor is operated that when in a passive mode no external DC voltage is applied and when in an active mode a small external DC voltage, e.g., 0.2 V, is applied. The sensor is tested using methanol aqueous solutions under stagnant conditions, i.e., without the use of a circulation pump. This is equivalent to measuring the methanol concentration in a mixing tank instead of in the flow channel as commonly used. Therefore, more accurate results are expected. However, it can also be operated with fuel solution in a flowing condition.
This embodiment serves to illustrate the principle of the electrochemical sensor in signal sensing by measurement the electro oxidation current of diffused methanol.
This embodiment serves to illustrate the capability of the electrochemical sensor in sensing concentration of an organic fuel solution other than methanol solution, such as formic acid solution. Formic acid has advantages of high safety and low crossover rate. It can be used as an alternative fuel for methanol.
This embodiment serves to illustrate the capability of the electrochemical sensor in sensing concentration of an inorganic fuel solution. Sodium borohydride has advantages of high hydrogen content and high electrochemical reaction rate. It can also be used as a fuel for membrane fuel cells.
This embodiment exemplifies the relationship between the sensor output signal and the fuel concentration through the use of a calibration curve, i.e., a plot of fuel electro oxidation current vs. fuel concentration.
This embodiment explores the correlation among current, temperature and methanol concentration in designing a practical electrochemical sensor. In general, there exists a linear calibration curve for the electrochemical sensor when the operation temperature is varied between 20 and 80° C.
Various additional modifications of the embodiments specifically illustrated and described herein will be apparent to those skilled in the art, particularly in light of the teachings of this invention. The invention should not be construed as limited to the specific form and examples as shown and described, but instead is set forth in the following claims.
