High hydrogen permeability of Pd-Ru-In membranes prepared by electroless co-deposition

In this work, Pd-Ru-In membranes were prepared by electroless co-deposition and characterized by SEM, XRD, XPS, AES and hydrogen permeation test. The results show that defect-free 5-6 mu m thick Pd-Ru-In membrane with homogeneous element distribution was successfully prepared. The composition of the membrane is Pd-Ru0.5at %-In1at% (M1) and Pd-Ru0.5at%-In2at% (M2), respectively. The hydrogen permeability of the membrane M2 reaches 1.32 x 10-8 mol & sdot;m- 1 & sdot;s- 1 & sdot;Pa- 0.5 at 773 K, which is 1.6 times higher than that of a Pd-Ru0.5at% membrane prepared under the same conditions. The addition of the element In leads to a structural evolution of the membrane: the lattice parameters of the Pd-Ru-In membranes increase. This lattice expansion results in an improvement in the hydrogen permeability. Our study provides a useful reference for the fabrication of Pd-Ru-In ternary membranes with high hydrogen permeability.