Highly active Vulcan carbon composite for oxygen reduction reaction in alkaline medium

Vulcan XC-72R carbon black (XC-72), the commonly applied support for electrocatalysts, is seldom investigated as an electrocatalyst itself for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR). In this work, Vulcan carbon composites (N-XC-72(Fe)) were prepared by pyrolyzing a mixture of Vulcan carbon, peptone and Fe salt at 800 degrees C in N-2 atmosphere, and characterized using SEM, TEM, XRD, Raman spectroscopy, and XPS analysis. Electrochemical analysis showed that the onset potential and half-wave potential for ORR on the N-XC-72(Fe) electrode was 0.017 and -0.151V respectively, lower than those of the XC-72 and N-XC-72 electrode. More importantly, N-XC-72(Fe) showed superior ORR performance than commercial Pt/C besides having better methanol tolerance. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.