Dimethyl ether (DME) as an alternative fuel

With ever growing concerns on environmental pollution, energy security, and future oil supplies, the global community is seeking non-petroleum based alternative fuels, along with more advanced energy technologies (e.g., fuel cells) to increase the efficiency of energy use. The most promising alternative fuel will be the fuel that has the greatest impact on society. The major impact areas include well-to-wheel greenhouse gas emissions, non-petroleum feed stocks, well-to-wheel efficiencies, fuel versatility, infrastructure, availability, economics, and safety. Compared to some of the other leading alternative fuel candidates (i.e., methane, methanol, ethanol, and Fischer–Tropsch fuels), dimethyl ether appears to have the largest potential impact on society, and should be considered as the fuel of choice for eliminating the dependency on petroleum.DME can be used as a clean high-efficiency compression ignition fuel with reduced NO_x, SO_x, and particulate matter, it can be efficiently reformed to hydrogen at low temperatures, and does not have large issues with toxicity, production, infrastructure, and transportation as do various other fuels. The literature relevant to DME use is reviewed and summarized to demonstrate the viability of DME as an alternative fuel.     

Sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone) as an ionomer for direct methanol fuel cell electrodes

Sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone) has been investigated as an ionomer in the catalyst layer for direct methanol fuel cells (DMFC). The performance in DMFC, electrochemical active area (by cyclic voltammetry), and limiting capacitance (by impedance spectroscopy) have been evaluated as a function of the ion exchange capacity (IEC) and content (wt.%) of the SPEEK ionomer in the catalyst layer. The optimum IEC value and SPEEK ionomer content in the electrodes are found to be, respectively, 1.33 meq. g⁻¹ and 20 wt.%. The membrane-electrode assemblies (MEA) fabricated with SPEEK membrane and SPEEK ionomer in the electrodes are found to exhibit superior performance in DMFC compared to that fabricated with Nafion ionomer due to lower interfacial resistance in the MEA as well as larger electrochemical active area. The MEAs with SPEEK membrane and SPEEK ionomer also exhibit better performance than that with Nafion 115 membrane and Nafion ionomer due to lower methanol crossover and better electrode kinetics.     

Optimum compositions of membrane electrode assemblies (MEAs) for direct dimethyl ether fuel cell

We investigated the effects of the compositions of catalyst layers and diffusion layers on performances of the membrane electrode assemblies (MEAs) for direct dimethyl ether fuel cell. The performances of the MEAs with different thicknesses of Nafion membranes were compared in this work. The optimal compositions in the anode are: 20 wt% Nafion content and 3.6 mg cm⁻² Pt loading in the catalyst layer, and 30 wt% PTFE content and 1 mg cm⁻² carbon black loading in the diffusion layer. In the cathode, MEA with 20 wt% Nafion content in the catalyst layer and 30 wt% PTFE content in the diffusion layer presented the optimal performance. The MEA with Nafion 115 membrane displayed the highest maximum power density of 46 mW cm⁻² among the three MEAs with different Nafion membranes. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone)/poly(ether sulfone) composite membranes as an alternative proton exchange membrane in microbial fuel cells

Custom-made proton exchange membranes (PEM) are synthesized by incorporating sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone) (SPEEK) in poly(ether sulfone) (PES) for electricity generation in microbial fuel cells (MFCs). The composite PES/SPEEK membranes at various composition of SPEEK are prepared by the phase inversion method. The membranes are characterized by measuring roughness, proton conductivity, oxygen diffusion, water crossover and electrochemical impedance. The conductivity of hydrophobic PES membrane increases when a small amount (3–5%) of hydrophilic SPEEK is added. The electrochemical impedance spectra shows that the conductivity and capacitance of PES/SPEEK composite membranes during MFC operation are reduced from 6.15 × 10⁻⁷ to 6.93 × 10⁻⁵ (3197 Ω–162 Ω) and from 3.00 × 10⁻⁷ to 1.56 × 10⁻³ F, respectively when 5% of SPEEK added into PES membrane. The PES/SPEEK 5% membrane has the highest performance compared to other membranes with a maximum power density of 170 mW m⁻² at the maximum current density of 340 mA m⁻². However, the interfacial reaction between the membrane and the cathode with Pt catalyst indicates moderate reaction efficiency compared to other membranes. The COD removal efficiency of MFCs with composite membrane PES/SPEEK 5% is nearly 26-fold and 2-fold higher than that of MFCs with Nafion 112 and Nafion 117 membranes respectively. The results suggest that the PES/SPEEK composite membrane is a promising alternative to the costly perfluorosulfonate membranes presently used as separators in MFC systems.     

Investigation of anode flow field for direct dimethyl ether fuel cell

In this work, we presented the novel anode flow field for direct dimethyl ether fuel cell (DDFC). The anode flow field of the DDFC consisted of hydrophilic, hydrophobic, and diffusion region (with a ratio of region areas of 3:6:1). The maximum power density of the DDFC with novel anode flow field was 67 mW cm⁻², which was higher than that of the cell fed with conventional flow field (60 mW cm⁻²). The electrochemical impedance spectra analyses revealed that the mass transfer resistance of novel anode flow field was lower than that of conventional flow field. The constant current operation curves showed that the performance decay ratio of the novel anode flow field was lower than that of conventional one. It indicated that the novel flow field benefited the long-term operation of DDFC.     

Nafion/nitrated sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone) membranes for direct methanol fuel cells

Sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone)s (SPEEKs) are substituted on the main chain of the polymer by nitro groups and blended with Nafion^® to attain composite membranes. The sulfonation, nitration and blending are achieved with a simple, inexpensive process, and the blended membranes containing the nitrated SPEEKs reveal a liquid-liquid phase separation. The blended membranes have a lower water uptake compared to recast Nafion^®, and the methanol permeability is reduced significantly to 4.29 × 10⁻⁷-5.34 × 10⁻⁷ cm² s⁻¹ for various contents of nitrated SPEEK for S63N17, and 4.72 × 10⁻⁷-7.11 × 10⁻⁷ cm² s⁻¹ for S63N38, with a maximum proton conductivity of ∼0.085 S cm⁻¹. This study examines the single-cell performance at 80 °C of Nafion^®/nitrated SPEEK membranes with various contents of nitrated SPEEK and a degree of nitration of 23-25 mW cm⁻² for S63N17 and 24-29 mW cm⁻² for S63N38. Both the power density and open circuit voltage are higher than those of Nafion^® 115 and recast Nafion^®.     

Novel branched sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone)s membranes for direct methanol fuel cells

In this article, novel branched sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone)s (Br-SPEEK) containing various amounts of 1,3,5-tris(4-fluorobenzoyl)benzene as the branching agent have been successfully prepared. Compared with the traditional linear polymer membranes, the membranes prepared by Br-SPEEK showed improved mechanical strength, excellent dimensional stability and superior oxidative stability with similar proton conductivity. Notably, the Br-SPEEK-10 membrane began to break after 267 min in Fenton's reagent at 80 °C, which was 4 times longer than that of the L-SPEEK. Although the proton conductivity decreased with the addition of the branching agent, satisfying methanol permeability value was observed (down to 6.3 × 10⁻⁷ cm² s⁻¹), which was much lower than Nafion 117 (15.5 × 10⁻⁷ cm² s⁻¹). All the results indicated that the novel branched sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone)s membrane was potential candidate as proton conductive membranes for application in fuel cells.     

l-Ascorbic acid as an alternative fuel for direct oxidation fuel cells

l-Ascorbic acid (AA) was directly supplied to polymer electrolyte fuel cells (PEFCs) as an alternative fuel. Only dehydroascorbic acid (DHAA) was detected as a product released by the electrochemical oxidation of AA via a two-electron transfer process regardless of the anode catalyst used. The ionomer in the anode may inhibit the mass transfer of AA to the reaction sites by electrostatic repulsion. In addition, polymer resins without an ionic group such as poly(vinylidene fluoride) and poly(vinyl butyral) were also useful for reducing the contact resistance between Nafion membrane and carbon black used as an anode, although an ionomer like Nafion is needed for typical PEFCs. A reaction mechanism at the two-phase boundaries between AA and carbon black was proposed for the anode structure of DAAFCs, since lack of the proton conductivity was compensated by AA. There was too little crossover of AA through a Nafion membrane to cause a serious technical problem. The best performance (maximum power density of 16 mW cm⁻²) was attained with a Vulcan XC72 anode that included 5 wt.% Nafion at room temperature, which was about one-third of that for a DMFC with a PtRu anode.     

Novel sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone) with pendant benzimidazole groups as a proton exchange membrane for direct methanol fuel cells

A series of sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone)s bearing pendant carboxylic acid groups (C-SPEEKs) have been prepared and subsequently react with 1,2-diaminobenzene to obtain sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone)s with pendant benzimidazole groups (BI-SPEEKs). The expected structures of the sulfonated copolymers are confirmed by ¹H NMR. The resulting copolymers all show good thermal and mechanical properties. It should be noted that the introduction of benzimidazole groups into the copolymer improves its thermal and oxidative stability obviously. Meanwhile, compared to C-SPEEK, BI-SPEEK membranes show much lower water uptake and methanol permeability with the same sulfonation degree (DS). In order to study morphological changes of C-SPEEK and BI-SPEEK membranes, hydrophilic domains sizes from an atomic force microscopy (AFM) are investigated.     

Anode reaction mechanism and crossover in direct dimethyl ether fuel cell

The anode reaction mechanism and the crossover of a direct dimethyl ether fuel cell (DDMEFC) have been investigated. This was done by considering the anode products of the half-cell and DDMEFC experiments. It was found that the CO₂ current efficiency of the DDMEFC was almost 1 at 30–80 °C and that this value was higher than that of a DMFC. The main by-products of the DDMEFC were methyl formate and methanol whose amounts are negligibly small compared to CO₂. With respect to crossover, the influence of DME on the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) was examined with a half-cell, and the amount of crossover of DME was measured while operating an actually constructed DDMEFC. From these experiments, it was found that DME does not influence the ORR as much as methanol under similar conditions. Furthermore, the amount of crossover of DME decreased with an increase in temperature and current density and it was one-half that of methanol on open circuit and at 80 °C.The CO₂ current efficiency of the DDMEFC is higher than that of a DMFC, and the influence of crossover in the DDMEFC is less than that in the DMFC. Since the temperature dependence of the reactivity of DME is larger than that of methanol, the higher output is expected for the DDMEFC at the elevated temperature. Therefore, the DDMEFC has a promising potential as a portable power source in the future.     

Sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone) membranes with sulfonated graphene oxide fillers for direct methanol fuel cells

Sulfonated organosilane functionalized graphene oxides (SSi-GO) synthesized through the grafting of graphene oxide (GO) with 3-mercaptopropyl trimethoxysilane and subsequent oxidation have been used as a filler in sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone) (SPEEK) membranes. The incorporation of SSi-GOs greatly increases the ion-exchange capacity (IEC), water uptake, and proton conductivity of the membrane. With well-controlled contents of SSi-GOs, the composite membranes exhibit higher proton conductivity and lower methanol permeability than Nafion^® 112 and Nafion^® 115, making them particularly attractive as proton exchange membranes (PEMs) for direct methanol fuel cells (DMFC). The composite membrane with optimal SSi-GOs content exhibit over 38 and 17% higher power densities, respectively, than Nafion^® 112 and Nafion^® 115 membranes in DMFCs, offering the possibilities to reduce the DMFC membrane cost significantly while keeping high-performance.     

二甲醚用作柴油机燃料的进展

介绍二甲醚作为柴油发动机燃料的进展 ,有关发动机的性能、微粒排放、燃料喷射、磨损和密封、着火延迟及安全性能问题     

Sulfonated poly(arylene ether sulfone) as a methanol-barrier layer in multilayer membranes for direct methanol fuel cells

Novel poly(arylene ether sulfone) copolymers containing different amount of pendant sulfonic acid groups have been synthesized by an aromatic substitution polymerization reaction. The properties of the synthesized sulfonated poly(diphenylsulfone-diphenol) (SDPS-DP) copolymers depend on the sulfonic acid group content in the copolymers. Although all the copolymers show good thermal stability, low liquid uptake, and low methanol crossover, they exhibit lower proton conductivity than Nafion or sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone) (SPEEK). Taking advantage of the low methanol crossover, multilayer membranes consisting of the SDPS-DP copolymer as a methanol-barrier center layer and SPEEK as the proton-conducting outer layers have been fabricated and characterized. The SPEEK/SDPS-DP-60/SPEEK multilayer membranes with an optimized center layer thickness are found to exhibit better performance and higher power density in DMFC than plain SPEEK and Nafion 115 membranes.     

Cross-linked membranes based on sulfonated poly (ether ether ketone) (SPEEK)/Nafion for direct methanol fuel cells (DMFCs)

A series of cross-linked membranes based on SPEEK/Nafion have been prepared to improve methanol resistance and dimension stability of SPEEK membrane for the usage in the direct methanol fuel cells (DMFCs). Sulfonated diamine monomer is synthesized and used as cross-linker to improve the dispersion of Nafion in the composite membranes and decrease the negative effect of cross-linking on proton conductivity of membranes. FT-IR analysis shows that the cross-linking reaction is performed successfully. The effects of different contents of Nafion on the properties of cross-linked membranes are investigated in detail. All the cross-linked membranes show lower methanol permeability and better dimensional stability compared with the pristine SPEEK membrane. SPEEK-N30 with the 30 wt % Nafion shows a methanol permeability of 0.73 × 10⁻⁶ cm² s⁻¹ and a water uptake of 24.4% at 25 °C, which are lower than those of the pristine membrane. Meanwhile, the proton conductivity of SPEEK-N30 still remains at 0.041 S cm⁻¹ at 25 °C, which is comparable to that of the pristine SPEEK membrane. All the results indicate that these cross-linked membranes based on SPEEK/Nafion show good prospect for the use as proton exchange membranes.     

A study of the direct dimethyl ether fuel cell using alkaline anolyte

The electrooxidation behavior of dimethyl ether (DME) dissolved in acidic, neutral or alkaline anolyte has been studied. The cyclic voltammetry measurements reveal that DME in alkaline anolyte demonstrates higher electrooxidation reactivity than that in acidic or neutral anolyte. With increasing the NaOH concentration in the anolyte, the electrooxidation reactivity of DME can be further improved. Direct dimethyl ether fuel cells (DDFCs) are assembled by using Nafion membrane as the electrolyte, Pt/C as the cathode catalyst, and Pt-Ru/C as the anode catalyst. It is found that the use of alkaline anolyte can significantly improve the performance of DDFCs. A maximum power density of 60 mW cm⁻² has been achieved when operating the DDFC at 80 °C under ambient pressure.     

A facile approach to prepare self-cross-linkable sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone) membranes for direct methanol fuel cells

Sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone) containing hydroxyl groups (SPEEK-OH) has been prepared for use as a proton exchange membrane (PEM) by reducing the carbonyl groups on the main chain of the polymers. With the goal of reducing water uptake and methanol permeability, a facile thermal-cross-linking process is used to obtain the cross-linked membranes. The properties of the cross-linked membranes with different cross-linked density are measured and compared with the pristine membrane. Notably, SPEEK-4 with the highest cross-linked density shows a water uptake of 39% and a methanol permeability of 2.52 × 10⁻⁷ cm² s⁻¹, which are much lower than those of the pristine membrane (63.2% and 5.37 × 10⁻⁷ cm² s⁻¹, respectively). These results indicate that this simple approach is very effective to prepare cross-linked proton exchange membranes for reducing water uptake and methanol permeability.     

Dimethyl ether as alternative fuel for CI engine and vehicle

As a developing and the most populous country in the world, China faces major challenges in energy supply and environmental protection. It is of great importance to develop clean and alternative fuels for internal combustion engines. On the basis of researches on DME engine and vehicle at Shanghai Jiaotong University in the last twelve years, fuel injection, combustion, performance and exhaust emissions of DME engine and DME vehicle are introduced in this paper. The results indicate that DME engines can achieve high thermal efficiency and ultra low emissions, and will play a significant role in meeting the energy demand while minimizing environmental impact in China.     

Dimethyl ether as alternative fuel for CI engine and vehicle

As a developing and the most populous country in the world, China faces major challenges in energy supply and environmental protection. It is of great importance to develop clean and alternative fuels for internal combustion engines. On the basis of researches on DME engine and vehicle at Shanghai Jiaotong University in the last twelve years, fuel injection, combustion, performance and exhaust emissions of DME engine and DME vehicle are introduced in this paper. The results indicate that DME engines can achieve high thermal efficiency and ultra low emissions, and will play a significant role in meeting the energy demand while minimizing environmental impact in China.     

An autonomous fuel cell: Methanol and dimethyl ether steam reforming direct fed to fuel cell

Studies of reforming systems integrated with Fuel Cells are interesting for energy production in remote regions, especially to develop multi-fuel processors, which can be fed by more than one fuel with no need to modify the unit. In this work, an Autonomous Fuel Cell (AFC) system with methanol and/or Dimethyl Ether Steam Reforming (SR) was modeled and simulated in Aspen Plus, evaluating process variables, appropriate operational conditions, and the need for additional processes. The maximum hydrogen formed is H₂/C = 3.0 (yield of 99.9%) and occurs generally with S/C ≥ 2 for several temperatures. The presence of a WGS reactor and a membrane for hydrogen purification was identified as vital to develop an AFC. In six situations that were studied with different operating conditions that meet the AFC operation, it was observed that the lowest temperature is preferable since it will consume the least amount of utility to maintain the SR.     

Crosslinked sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone) proton exchange membranes for direct methanol fuel cell applications

In the present study, a series of the crosslinked sulfonated poly(ether ether ketone) (SPEEK) proton exchange membranes were prepared. The photochemical crosslinking of the SPEEK membranes was carried out by dissolving benzophenone and triethylamine photo-initiator system in the membrane casting solution and then exposing the resulting membranes after solvent evaporation to UV light. The physical and transport properties of crosslinked membranes were investigated. The membrane performance can be controlled by adjusting the photoirradiation time. The experimental results showed that the crosslinked SPEEK membranes with photoirradiation 10 min had the optimum performance for proton exchange membranes (PEMs). Compared with the non-crosslinked SPEEK membranes, the crosslinked SPEEK membranes with photoirradiation 10 min markedly improved thermal stabilities and mechanical properties as well as hydrolytic and oxidative stabilities, greatly reduced water uptake and methanol diffusion coefficients with only slight sacrifice in proton conductivities. Therefore, the crosslinked SPEEK membranes with photoirradiation 10 min were particularly promising as proton exchange membranes for direct methanol fuel cell (DMFC) applications.