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Insights into electrochemical behavior and kinetics of NiP on PEDOT:PSS/reduced graphene oxide as high-performance electrodes for alkaline urea oxidation

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Abstract

Highly efficient, abundant, and low-cost materials are highly demanded for energy conversion applications to address the rising consumption of energy. In this study, polythiophene/reduced graphene (PT/rGO) and PEDOT:PSS/rGO (both Clevios PH1000 and Clevios P Al PH4083) as an efficient and low-cost support material were synthesized via a one-pot two-step in situ chemical polymerization method to enhance the electrocatalytic performance of NiP towards urea oxidation in alkaline media. These materials were characterized using SEM, FTIR, XRD, UV-Vis, and TGA devices. The physical characterization reveals nanospherical NiP with multifaceted phases dispersed on PT/rGO and PEDOT:PSS/rGO. The electrochemical activities of as-synthesized catalyst materials towards urea electrooxidation were tested by using cyclic voltammetry. The electrochemical activity test exhibits the significant performance improvement of NiP when supported on PT/rGO and both grades of PEDOT:PSS incorporated rGO materials. Among the support materials, the highest performance enhancement with a high current density of 91.2 mAcm−2 and lower onset potential of 0.26 V, high electrochemically active surface area, high kinetics, and high stability towards alkaline urea electrooxidation was achieved when NiP dispersed on the surface of PEDOT:PSS/rGO (PH4083). Thus, a new PEDOT:PSS/rGO (PH4083) supported NiP (NiP@PEDOT:PSS/rGO) remarkably outperformed commercial NiP, making it to be a promising anode electrocatalyst material for alkaline urea electrooxidation in direct urea fuel cell (DUFC).

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Acknowledgements

The support from Mr. Varun Adiga, Ms. Shweta Shekar, Mr. Sandeep Satyanarayana, and Dr. Simranjeet Singh, Department of Materials Engineering, Indian Institute of Science was highly acknowledged. Part of this work was conducted at Jimma University, Institute of Technology.

Funding

This work was supported by the Ministry of Science and Higher Education, Ethiopia, and IoE grant R(VI)090/23/2019-20 356 ( Indian Institute of Science, India).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Materials Science and Engineering, Jimma Institute of Technology, Jimma University, P.O. Box: 378, Jimma, Oromia, Ethiopia

    Israel Leka Lera, Lodrick Makokha Wangatia & Olu Emmanuel Femi

  2. Department of Materials Engineering, Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, 560012, Karnataka, India

    Sutripto Khasnabis & Praveen C Ramamurthy

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  1. Israel Leka Lera
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  3. Lodrick Makokha Wangatia
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  4. Olu Emmanuel Femi
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  5. Praveen C Ramamurthy
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Contributions

Israel Leka: conceptualization, methodology, and project administration. Sutripto Khasnabis: resources, facilitation, validation, and editing. Lodrick Wangatia: data curation, supervision, and project administration. Femi Olu: data curation and supervision. Praveen C. Ramamurthy: supervision, validation, resources, and material-funding acquisition.

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Correspondence to Olu Emmanuel Femi or Praveen C Ramamurthy.

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Lera, I.L., Khasnabis, S., Wangatia, L.M. et al. Insights into electrochemical behavior and kinetics of NiP on PEDOT:PSS/reduced graphene oxide as high-performance electrodes for alkaline urea oxidation. J Solid State Electrochem 26, 195–209 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10008-021-05080-z

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