Properties of SPEEK based PEMs for fuel cell application

Comparative studies of membranes prepared using different solvents, have shown that the casting solvent plays a significant role, affecting their proton conductivity and mechanical strength. It has been found that using DMF strongly decreases the membrane conductivity in comparison with other solvents studied. The 1H NMR results yield an insight into the mechanism of this effect, evidencing the formation of the strong hydrogen bonding of sulfonic acid groups with DMF. This can explain the large discordances of more than an order of magnitude existing between the conductivity results for sulfonated polyetheretherketone (PEEK) in some previous studies and in this work. It is also found that residual sulphuric acid, which is very difficult to eliminate from highly sulfonated polyetheretherketone (SPEEK), also affects its conductivity and under high temperature treatment, enters into reaction with both DMF and N,N-dimethylacetamide (DMAc), causing their degradation. As discussed in the present contribution, the conductivity measurement technique may also be a reason for discrepancy in the reported conductivity characteristics of SPEEK.