Synthesis of Sulfonated Polystyrene/acrylate–ionic Liquid (Si-SPS/A–IL) Hybrid Membranes for Methanol Fuel Cells

In this paper, the silicon-containing sulfonated polystyrene/acrylate–ionic liquid (Si-SPS/A–IL)hybrid membranes was prepared to obtain the proton exchange membrane (PEM) materials withhigh methanol barrier and good selectivity. The Si-SPS/A–IL hybrid membranes characterized asthe function of IL to evaluate their potential as PEMs in direct methanol fuel cells (DMFCs).Fourdifferent Hybrid material with different properties have been synthesized and named from I toIV.The potential of the membranes in direct methanol fuel cells (DMFCs) is characterizedpreliminarily by studying their thermal stability, ion-exchange capacity, water uptake, methanoldiffusion coefficient, proton conductivity and selectivity (proton conductivity/methanol diffusioncoefficient). All the hybrid membranes exhibit good thermal stability and reasonable water uptake.IV and V membranes have a low methanol diffusion coefficient, while II and III membrane havegood proton conductivity. In addition, the selectivity values of hybrid membranes increase withincreasing IL content and V membrane shows the best selectivity (1.14×105Ss cm−3). These resultssuggest that the Si-SPS/A–IL hybrid membranes are possible candidate materials for PEMs inDMFC applications.