%0 Journal Article %A Jason K Lee %A Tobias Schuler %A Guido Bender %A Mayank Sabharwal %A Xiong Peng %A Adam Z Weber %A Nemanja Danilovic %B Applied Energy %D 2023 %G eng %P 120853 %R 10.1016/j.apenergy.2023.120853 %T Interfacial engineering via laser ablation for high-performing PEM water electrolysis %U https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0306261923002179 %V 336 %8 02/2023 %! Applied Energy %X

A rationalized interfacial design strategy was applied to tailor the porous transport layer (PTL)-catalyst layer (CL) contact and the PTL bulk-phase architecture. Particularly, at the PTL-CL interface, our results reveal that laser ablated sintered titanium power-based PTLs improve electrolyzer performance at both the H2NEW Consortium baseline catalyst loading of 0.4 mgIr·cm⁻² as well as at the ultra-low catalyst loading of 0.055 mgIr·cm⁻². Under ultra-low catalyst loadings, the laser ablated PTL demonstrates maximum reduction of 230 mV compared to the commercial PTL at 4 A·cm⁻², and reduces by 68 mV at 3.2 A·cm⁻² under H2NEW baseline loading. Laser ablation alters the titanium phase at the interface, so it forms more uniform structure like a microporous layer or a backing layer, leading to an increase in the surface area in contact with the catalyst layer while preventing the membrane from deforming into the PTL. Moreover, we reveal that bulk-phase architecture modification of the PTL by ablating patterned pores at the flow field-PTL interface improves mass transport without sacrificing contact at the CL-PTL interface. Overall, laser ablation of the PTL is an effective method to customize interfacial design to enhance proton exchange membrane electrolyzer performance.