Activity analysis of Pd-based catalysts from the performance modeling of polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells

[Display omitted] •Modeling-based assessment of catalytic activity is conducted for fuel cell catalysts.•Oxygen reduction and hydrogen oxidation activities are extracted.•Model validation is conducted with polarization curves of 22 Pd/Pt-based catalysts.•Effectiveness of various approaches to catalytic activity enhancement is assessed.•Degree of variation in exchange current density in each approach is quantified. Well-defined benchmarks and measurement methods of catalytic activity are critical in the development of energy devices including fuel cells. In this study, the modeling-based activity assessment of various Pd-based catalysts, whose polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cell performance is measured under the same experimental conditions, is conducted to extract oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) and hydrogen oxidation reaction (HOR) exchange current densities. 19 types of Pd-based ORR/HOR catalysts are selected for the analysis from 10 research papers that Samsung and its affiliated researchers have published in the last decade. The impacts of the binary/ternary alloying of Pd, the composition optimization of Pd binary alloys, the addition of co-catalysts, and the structural modification of Pd-based alloys into a core–shell structure on the ORR/HOR exchange current density are determined. This modeling-based evaluation of catalytic activity would provide an unbiased guideline on the effectiveness of various research approaches in the development of ORR and HOR catalysts.