Abstract
We have employed a facile and simultaneous route to synthesize tungsten carbide/porous graphitic carbon (WC/PGC) nanocomposites with the sizes of WC nanoparticles (NPs) are about 10 nm, large special surface area and plentiful porous structures. After loading 10% Pt NPs on the synthesized WC-PGC, the synthesized Pt-WC/PGC catalysts exhibit well performance for methanol electrooxidation. The current density of Pt-WC/PGC towards methanol electrooxidation is 1.9 times as that of commercial 20% Pt/C catalyst. Moreover, the Pt-WC/PGC catalyst also shows excellent durability compared to commercial 20% Pt/C catalyst. The well performance should be attributed to tungsten carbides with the Pt-like characteristic, could improve CO tolerant, simultaneously, the large special surface area and porous structures of porous graphite carbon is favor to mass transport. The present method will lead to the commercialized development of direct methanol fuel cells.