The effect of noble metal addition on the polarization behavior of hydrogen (H2) oxidation and oxygen (O2) reduction on 304 stainless steel (SS) in high temperature, high purity water was studied. It is evident that the incorporation of small amounts of noble metals dramatically improves the hydrogen oxidation kinetics and thus enhances the catalytic recombination efficiency of H2 to O2, to form H2O. The enhancement in the catalytic nature on 304 SS surface doped with noble metals results in a thermodynamically lowest electrochemical corrosion potential (ECP) value...
Key words: electrochemical polarization, oxygen, hydrogen, 304 SS, noble metal, high temperature water, ECP, BWR