Study of Methanol‐tolerant Oxygen Reduction Reaction at Pt–Bi/C Bimetallic Nanostructured Catalysts

The nanostructured platinum–bismuth catalysts supported on carbon (Pt3Bi/C, PtBi/C and PtBi3/C) were synthesised by reducing the aqueous metal ions using sodium borohydride (NaBH4) in presence of a microemulsion. The amount of metal loading on carbon support was found to be 10 wt.‐%. The catalyst materials were characterised by X‐ray diffraction (XRD), X‐ray fluorescence (XRF), transmission electron microscope (TEM) and electroanalytical techniques. The Pt3Bi/C, PtBi/C and PtBi3/C catalysts showed higher methanol tolerance, catalytic activity for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) than Pt/C of same metal loading. The electrochemical stability of these nano‐sized catalyst materials for methanol tolerance was investigated by repetitive cycling in the potential range of –250 to 150 mVMSE. Bi presents an interesting system to have a control over the activity of the surface for MOR and ORR. All Pt–Bi/C catalysts exhibited higher mass activities for oxygen reduction (1–1.5 times) than Pt/C. It was found that PtBi/C catalyst exhibits better methanol‐tolerance than the other catalysts.