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30% of CO2 emissions in German road traffic are caused by heavy duty vehicles, although they account for only 10% of all vehicles. Significant amounts of CO2 can therefore be saved in this sector by electrifying relatively few vehicles. This can be done most economically with fuel cells. For this purpose, fuel cells for long lifetimes (30 000h) must be developed.

For the transformation to a CO₂-neutral society, large amounts of green hydrogen are needed, e.g. for fuel cells, emission-free steel or power-to-X applications (fertilizers, …). Besides the electricity price, the investment costs and the lifetime of the electrolysers are significantly responsible for the hydrogen production costs. Due to the large cost reduction potential, alkaline electrolysis with a „anion exchange membrane“ (AEM) is a highly attractive technology. It promises to combine the advantages of the established alkaline and acidic membrane-based electrolysis, i.e. low-cost materials with high current densities and high efficiency.

Proton exchange membrane water electrolysis is a central technology for the production of green hydrogen. The proton exchange membrane is usually based on perfluorosulfonic acids, as these have a high level of stability. However, membrane materials based on hydrocarbons have the potential to significantly outperform the standard perfluorsulfonic acid materials due to a significantly lower gas permeability. In addition, the synthesis of hydrocarbon membranes does not involve fluorine chemistry, so that the production of this type of membrane is potentially much cheaper and more environmentally friendly than the production of prefluorsulfonic acids. To take advantage of the positive characteristic of hydrocarbon materials the planned project targets to increase the life-time of hydrocarbon based water electrolyzers by simultaneously maintining high performance.