A novel method to significantly boost the electrocatalytic activity of carbon cloth for oxygen evolution reaction. (April 2018) - Huang, Dekang
Abstract: To realize energy-efficient and cost-effective production of hydrogen by electrochemical water splitting, central to the research endeavors is the exploration of highly active and earth-abundant electrocatalysts for oxygen evolution reaction (OER). Promising non-noble candidates for OER are often based on transition metal oxides, while carbon-based electrocatalysts typically receive little attention due to their relatively poor performance. In this work, we present a novel method to significantly activate carbon cloth for OER by creating oxygen-containing functional groups on its surface with the assistance of peroxovanadium complexes, which have been seldom used to oxidize carbon materials. Compared to pristine carbon cloth (P-CC), the activated carbon cloth (A-CC) exhibits higher specific surface area and faster electron transfer rate. Particularly, the overpotential of A-CC (310 mV) to afford a current density of 10 mA cm −2 is much lower than that of P-CC and even comparable to that of noble RuO2 /C (280 mV), ranking A-CC among the best reported nonmetal catalysts for OER. Moreover, densely distributed VO2 (B) nanoplates in the intermediate product of VO2 (B)/CC can prevent the highly active A-CC from degrading in air for two months, which endows another excellent feature for this fabrication method. Graphical abstract: Image 1