Abstract
Evaluation of the electrocatalyst performance data includes an electrode preparation step. In this work, we compare the structural composition of several Fe-N-C materials prepared via different synthesis routes and used to electrocatalyze the oxygen reduction reaction in proton-exchange membrane fuel cells, before and after catalyst layer preparation using high energy resolution fluorescence detected X-ray absorption (HERFD XANES) and X-ray emission spectroscopies (XES). The measurements were performed at beamline ID26 of the European synchrotron (ESRF).