A Novel High Temperature Fuel Cell Proton Exchange Membrane with Nanoscale Phase Separation Structure Based on Crosslinked Polybenzimidazole with Poly(vinylbenzyl chloride).

A semi-aromatic polybenzimidazole (DPBI) is synthesized via polycondensation of decanedioic acid (DCDA) and 3,3-diaminobenzidine (DAB) in a mixed phosphorus pentoxide/methanesulfonic acid (PPMA) solvent. Ascribing to in-situ macromolecular crosslinker of ploly((vinylbenzyl chloride) (PVBC), a robust crosslinked DPBI membrane (DPBI-PVBC, refers to the weight percentage of PVBC in the membrane) can be obtained. Comprehensive properties of the DPBI and DPBI-PVBC membranes are investigated, including chemical structure, antioxidant stability, mechanical strength, PA uptake and electrochemical performances. Compared with pristine DPBI membrane, the PA doped DPBI-PVBC membranes exhibit excellent antioxidative stability, high proton conductivity and enhanced mechanical strength. The PA doped DPBI-PVBC membrane shows a proton conductivity of 49 mS cm at 160 °C without humidification. Particularly, it reveals an enhanced H/O single cell performance with the maximum peak power density of 405 mW cm, which is 29% higher than that of pristine DPBI membrane (314 mW cm). In addition, the cell is very stable in 50 h, indicating the in-situ crosslinked DPBI with a macromolecular crosslinker of PVBC is an efficient way to improve the overall performance of HT-PEMs for high performance HT-PEMFCs.