Schmidt membrane materials

Schmidt-Rohr K, Chen Q (2008) Parallel cylindrical water nanochaimels in Nafion fuel-cell membranes . Nature Materials 7 75. 

In 2002, Schmidt et al. estimated the cost of the first PEMFCs as 20,000/kW (here and below, all prices are in U.S. dollars). Of this figure, 90% was for labor (the cells were hand-made), and only 10% was for materials. In mass production, for instance when making 1 million 50-kW power plants per year, labor cost could fall to 10/kW. In the opinion of Schmidt et al., it would be necessary to develop new membranes costing no more than 20/m, and to lower the platinum content of the electrodes to 0.25 mg/cm, in order to bring the cost of material down from 2000/kW to a desirable figure of 30/kW or at least to a temporarily acceptable value of 100 to 200/kW (also, platinum should be recovered and recycled). A very important and difficult problem is that of making cheaper corrosion-resistant metallic bipolar plates. All ancillary devices must also become much cheaper. 

Wilhite, B.A., Weiss, S.E., Ying, J.Y., Schmidt, M.A. and Jensen, K.F. (2006) High-purity hydrogen generation in a microfabricated 23wt% Ag-Pd membrane device integrated with 8 1 LaNi jCo djOj/Al Oj catalyst. Advanced Materials, 18, 1701-1704. 

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