Study On Preparation And Performance Of Perovskite Catalyst For Zinc Air Battery

Zinc–air battery has become the focus of battery research recently. Because of its high specific energy, stable performance, environmentally–friendly character, inexpensive price and the abundance of raw materials, zinc–air battery is regarded as "the green energy for the 21st century".Air electrode was prepared using MnO2 as catalyst. The polarization characteristic of air electrode was investigated by the method of steady-state polarization curves. The optimum conditions for air electrode preparation were shown as follow: molding pressure of electrode 3 MPa, 13 mass% PTFE and 15 mass% Mn02 in active layer.The perovskite oxides LaMnO3 catalyst was prepared by sol-gel process. We studied the relationship of the electrocatalytic activity of perovskite oxides LaMnO3 catalysts with the partial substitution at A sites and B site with Sr,Ca,Fe,Ni,Co,Cr. The synthesized La1-x Ax Mn1-yByO3 (x,y = 0~0.5,A= Sr,Ca, B= Fe, Ni, Cr, Co) catalyst still has the perovskite structure according to the test result of XRD. When examined under the TEM with 190K amplifying scale, the granules of the catalyst showed a relatively small diameter of approximately 30nm, but the granules tend to band together.Through the method of polarization curves we found that when doped with Sr,Fe,Ni,Cr elements, the activity of catalyst was enhanced. On the other hand, when doped with Ca and Co, the activity of catalyst decreased.When we doped LaMn0.8Ni0.2O3 with Sr, the activity of catalyst enhanced, but when we doped LaMn0.8Cr0.2O3 with Sr, the activity of catalyst showed little change.Through the method of CV curves we found that when doped with Sr or Co elements,the stability of catalyst was decreased. The stability of catalyst is best when doped with Fe.