Addressing the Stability of Bulk Electrode Materials in the Electrochemical Methanol Oxidation

Besides activity and selectivity, the stability is of great importance in the development of catalysts for long-term applications. However, the lack of standardized stability protocols in electrocatalysis remains a fundamental hurdle hindering progress in the field by the lack of quantitative comparability of data in different studies. Herein, an electrochemical protocol to address the stability of bulk electrodes is developed. The protocol tests in situ and operando stability in the electrochemical methanol oxidation in alkaline media using the intermetallic compounds SnPd2 and ZnPd2 as test materials. Stability tests resulted in an equimolar mixture of 0.5 M methanol and 0.5 M KOH being the optimum composition of the electrolyte to obtain low corrosion rates and in ZnPd2 being less stable than SnPd2. The reported protocol is a first, easy-to-do step to investigate the stability of electrode materials which is a prerequisite for application as well as a knowledge-based development of new electrode materials. (C) The Author(s) 2019. Published by ECS.