Comparative Studies of Fe, Ni, Co and Their Bimetallic Nanoparticles for Electrochemical Water Oxidation

Authors

Maduraiveeran Govindhan, Department of Chemistry, Lakehead University, 955 Oliver Road, Thunder Bay, Ontario P7B 5E1, Canada;
Brennan Mao, Department of Chemistry, Lakehead University, 955 Oliver Road, Thunder Bay, Ontario P7B 5E1, Canada;
Aicheng Chen, Department of Chemistry, Lakehead University, 955 Oliver Road, Thunder Bay, Ontario P7B 5E1, Canada;Follow

Corresponding Author

Aicheng Chen(aicheng.chen@lakeheadu.ca)

Abstract

The design of efficient, durable, and earth-abundant electrocatalysts via environmentally compatible strategies for the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) is a vital for energy conversion processes. Herein we report a facile approach for the fabrication of low-cost and earth abundant metal catalysts, including iron (Fe), nickel (Ni), cobalt (Co), CoNi, and CoFe nanoparticles (NPs) on titanium (Ti) substrates through a one-step electrochemical deposition. Field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM), energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX), X-ray diffraction (XRD) spectrocopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), and electrochemical techniques were employed to characterize these nanoparticles. Our electrochemical results revealed that among the five synthesized nanomaterials, the Ti/Co electrode exhibited the highest electrocatalytic activity toward OER in 0.l mol·L^-1 KOH with a current density of 10.0 mA·cm^-2 at 0.70 V vs. Ag/AgCl. The optimized Ti/Co electrode exhibited a small overpotential (η) of 0.43 V at 10.0 mA·cm^-2 and a high mass activity of 105.7 A·g^-1 with a turnover frequency (TOF) value of 1.63×10^-3 s^-1, which are comparable to the values obtained with the state-of-the-art Pt/C and RuO₂ electrocatalysts. In addition, the durability of the optimized Ti/Co electrode was tested using a chronopotentiometric technique, which revealed that the developed electrocatalyst possessed good stability for OER in an alkaline solution. The high catalytic activity, high stability, earth abundance, cost-effectiveness, and easy scale-up for mass production make the Co nanoparticles, which were electrochemically deposited on a Ti substrate, promising for industrial water splitting

Graphical Abstract

Keywords

cobalt nanoparticle, electrochemical deposition, electrocatalyst, oxygen evolution reaction, energy conversion

DOI Link

https://doi.org/10.13208/j.electrochem.161247

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Publication Date

2017-04-28

Online Available Date

2017-03-22

Revised Date

2017-03-21

Received Date

2016-12-02

Recommended Citation

Maduraiveeran Govindhan, Brennan Mao, Aicheng Chen. Comparative Studies of Fe, Ni, Co and Their Bimetallic Nanoparticles for Electrochemical Water Oxidation[J]. Journal of Electrochemistry, 2017 , 23(2): 159-169.
DOI: 10.13208/j.electrochem.161247
Available at: https://jelectrochem.xmu.edu.cn/journal/vol23/iss2/6