Researchers at IMDEA Materials Institute have developed a new catalyst that can deliver platinum-like performance while using 75% less platinum. The result could help lower the cost of hydrogen fuel cells, where platinum is an important but expensive catalyst material.
The work was led by Jorge Redondo, the study’s lead author, along with researchers from IMDEA Materials Institute and the Polytechnic University of Madrid. The study was published in Electrochimica Acta and examines how controlled mechanical strain can change the performance of a copper-platinum catalyst.
Platinum is widely used in hydrogen fuel cells because it helps speed up the oxygen reduction reaction, or ORR. This reaction is one of the slower steps in a fuel cell, so reducing the amount of platinum without losing performance could make the technology more affordable.
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The researchers made the catalyst from a copper-platinum alloy called Cu₃Pt. They placed it on a nickel-titanium material and applied a small amount of compression, changing the way atoms and electrons behave at the catalyst surface.
The compression was less than 1%. In tests, the compressed catalyst reached 855 millivolts at 1 mA/cm², almost matching pure platinum at 856 millivolts under the same conditions. The Electrochimica Acta paper says this combination of compression and surface changes produced platinum-equivalent ORR activity with only one-quarter of the platinum content.
The process also creates a thin platinum-rich surface. During testing, some copper leaves the outer part of the alloy, forming a layer about 5–10 nanometers thick. This means the researchers can keep platinum where it is most useful while using much less of the metal overall.
There are still important limits. The results come from laboratory tests on thin films, and the researchers have not yet shown that the catalyst can be produced cheaply at large industrial scale or that its performance will remain stable during long-term fuel-cell operation. The Electrochimica Acta study therefore points to a promising catalyst design, rather than a finished commercial fuel-cell product.
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Main breakthrough: The researchers showed that mechanical compression can improve a Cu₃Pt catalyst enough to match the oxygen-reduction performance of pure platinum while using 75% less platinum. If the effect can be maintained in larger and longer-running fuel cells, it could help reduce one of the major material costs of hydrogen fuel-cell systems.
