proton conducting nanocomposite membranes based on poly vinyl alcohol (pva) / glutaraldehyde (ga) for proton exchange membrane fuel cells

In the present work, bace0.85yb0.15o3-δ mixed metal oxide nanoparticles supplying strong acid sites and good hydrophilic nature were used for the first time to build organic-inorganic proton exchange membranes. poly(vinyl alcohol) - bace0.85yb0.15o3-δ (pvayb) nanocomposite membranes were fabricated. different analyses such as scanning electron microscope (sem), energy dispersive x-ray (edx) spectroscopy, fourier transform infra-red (ft-ir) spectroscopy, and thermogravimetry analysis (tga) were used to characterize and study the structural properties of the obtained membranes. sem and edx analyses exhibited a homogenous dispersion of the nanoparticles in the nanocomposite membrane. it was found that pvayb1.5 had a better elemental distribution compared to pvayb2.5 composite membrane. pvayb nanocomposite membrane containing 1.5 wt.% of bace0.85yb0.15o3-δ nanoparticles displayed a high proton conductivity value (64 ms/cm) at 70 °c operation temperature. the peak power density of 29 mw/cm2 was obtained with a peak current density of 210 ma / cm2 for as-prepared proton exchange membrane fuel cell (pemfc) equipped with ppyb1.5 nanocomposite membrane at 70 °c.