Abstract
Multiwall carbon nanotubes are modified by urea (MWCNTs-U), as an amide group, through a simple amination method to be used as support for Pt nanoparticles in methanol electrooxidation reaction (MOR). The amination method involves a covalent grafting of urea molecules onto the surface of acid treated multiwall carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs-A) using O-(7-azabenzotriazol-1-yl)-N,N,N′,N′-tetramethyluronium hexafluorophosphate (HATU) as the coupling agent. Platinum nanoparticles are impregnated on the surface of MWCNTs-U using NaBH4. Pt/MWCNTs-U shows an enhanced electrocatalytic activity and durability with exposing larger accessible surface area and 27% higher active surface area compared to Pt/MWCNTs-A. In addition, urea incorporation can improve the electrocatalyst tolerance against CO-poisoning, due to the enhanced formation kinetics of the chemisorbed hydroxyl groups. The onset potential of COads oxidation indicates a decrease from 553 mV to 530 mV for Pt/MWCNTs-A and Pt/MWCNTs-U, respectively. It is observed that in the presence of amide group the forward peak current density and exchange current density, in CV and LSV experiments, respectively increase from 378 to 515 mA/mgPt and 1.59 × 10−8 A/cm2 to 2.12 × 10−8 A/cm2. These results are also in a good agreement with the theoretical activation energies obtained from Arrhenius plots, indicating a decrease from 41.7 to 38.8 kJ/mol methanol in the case of Pt/MWCNTs-A and Pt/MWCNTs-U, respectively.