Developments of water electrolysis technology by solid polymer electrolyte

Abstract

Water electrolysis by solid polymer electrolyte is the most promising technology for large-scale hydrogen production for future. The concept introduced by General Electric Co. (U.S.A) in late sixties has been adopted by Brown Boveri Research Center, Baden, Switzerland and more recently by Japan under WE-NET Japanese Hydrogen Programme Project. For the last

25 years, this field has witnessed a lot of activity, in research and development of energy efficient water electrolyzers. In this review, the selection of high activity electrocatalysts, methods to prepare SPE electrocatalyst composites, their stability, the pretreatment of solid polymer electrolyte membrane for the deposition of electrocatalysts, the fabrication of current collectors, the scale up of water electrolyzers and recent advances has been discussed.