Nanosized amorphous nickel-boron alloy electrocatalysts for hydrogen evolution reaction under alkaline conditions
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摘要: 可持续能源电解水制氢是实现零碳排放氢经济的有效途径。碱性环境下的电催化析氢反应(HER)是电解水技术主要的能量转换过程之一。开发高活性、低成本的非贵金属催化剂是碱性电解水析氢反应的关键所在。本研究以壳寡糖为保护剂,采用简单易行的化学还原法制备了纳米NiB非晶合金电催化剂并用于碱性析氢反应。采用X射线衍射(XRD)、透射电子显微镜(TEM)、电感耦合等离子体分析(ICP)和X射线光电子能谱(XPS)等多种表征方法研究了不同条件下获得的催化剂结构组成及特征物性参数。结果表明,壳寡糖的加入可以有效调控纳米粒子的平均粒径为4 nm左右,提升活性比表面积,增加活性位点,从而提高其电催化活性。所制备的NiB-COS在1.0 mol/L NaOH中表现出优异的HER性能,析氢反应起始过电位仅为15.1 mV,在电流密度为10 mA/cm2时HER过电位为49.4 mV,Tafel斜率为86.1 mV/dec,为制备高活性、低成本、简单易得的HER电催化剂提供了重要策略。Abstract: Hydrogen production from electrolyzed water driven by sustainable energy is an effective way to achieve the hydrogen economy with zero carbon emission. Alkaline electrocatalytic hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) is one of the main energy transforming processes in the field of electrolytic water technology. The development of active and cost-effective nonprecious catalytic electrodes is of great importance to alkaline hydrogen evolution reaction. Amorphous nanosized nickel-boron alloy particles (NiB-COS) have been obtained by using chitosan oligosaccharides (COS) as a stabilizer via chemical reduction method. The as-prepared electrocatalysts have been used for the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). The electrocatalysts have been characterized by using X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), inductively coupled plasma analysis (ICP) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). NiB-COS displays a significant increase in hydrogen evolution reaction properties in alkaline media, affording low overpotentials of 49.4 mV at 10 mA/cm2 and 15.1 mV onset overpotential for the hydrogen evolution reaction. Tafel slope of NiB-COS is 86.1 mV/dec. Remarkably, the formation of a nickel-boron alloyed phase and the decrease of particle size are helpful to improve HER activity of NiB-COS. The experimental data indicated that the NiB-COS showed excellent long-term stability as a very active electrocatalyst.
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Key words:
- hydrogen evolution reaction /
- NiB-COS /
- overpotential /
- Tafel slope /
- alkaline water electrolysis
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Table 1 Surface areas and bulk composition of the NiB and NiB-COS catalysts
Catalyst Composition BET surface area /(m2·g−1 ) NiB Ni69.5B30.5 29.5 NiB-COS Ni74.5B25.5 68.6 Table 2 HER performance of NiB-based electrocatalysts in basic solution
Electrolyte Overpotential NiB-COS Pt black NiB-COS/ NiB NiB/ NiB NiB onset overpotential /mV 15.1 56.5 122.9 349.7 355.8 Basic condition overpotential
/mV @(10 mA/cm2)49.4 137.0 170.9 387.1 398.5 Tafel slope /(mV·dec−1) 86.1 120.2 94.5 66.4 77.3 -
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