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Boosting hydrogen production via urea electrolysis on an amorphous nickel phosphide/graphene hybrid structure

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Abstract

Overall urea electrolysis has favorable thermodynamic properties and can complement traditional water splitting by simultaneously purifying urea-rich waste streams. However, the kinetics of the reaction is slow and more efficient catalysts are required. In this work, we describe a facile way to fabricate amorphous nickel phosphides on graphene nanosheets (a-Ni2P/G), which shows high efficient performance for overall urea electrolysis. The a-Ni2P/G catalyst has abundant surface area for abundant catalytic active sites and high proportion of Ni3+ active sites, realizing a superior intrinsic activity for both hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) and urea oxidation reaction (UOR). Impressively, the a-Ni2P/G catalyst requires only much lower potentials of 1.28 V and − 0.1 V for UOR and HER at 10 mA cm−2. The assembled a-Ni2P/G║a-Ni2P/G electrolyzer needs a small cell voltage of 1.39 V to deliver the current density of 10 mA cm−2. This work highlights a promising pathway to develop a cost-efficient catalyst for energy-saving H2 generation combined with waste water purification.

Graphical abstract

A highly efficient amorphous catalyst of a-Ni2P/G with high surface area and abundant exposed catalytic sites is reported. The assembled a-Ni2P/G║a-Ni2P/G system shows a quite small cell voltage of 1.39 V to deliver 10 mA cm−2, which is better than most of bifunctional catalysts.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (21905251) and the Science Foundation of Zhejiang Sci-Tech University (ZSTU) under Grant No. 18062242-Y. Y. Tong is also partially supported by a fellowship from the China Scholarship Council (CSC) and the Swiss Government Excellence Scholarship.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemistry, School of Sciences, Zhejiang Sci-Tech University, 928 Second Avenue, Xiasha High Education Zone, Hangzhou, 310018, People’s Republic of China

    Yun Tong

  2. Institute of Chemical Sciences and Engineering, École Polytechnique Fedérale de Lausanne (EPFL), 1015, Lausanne, Switzerland

    Yun Tong, Lu Chen, Paul J. Dyson & Zhaofu Fei

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  1. Yun Tong
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  2. Lu Chen
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Tong, Y., Chen, L., Dyson, P.J. et al. Boosting hydrogen production via urea electrolysis on an amorphous nickel phosphide/graphene hybrid structure. J Mater Sci 56, 17709–17720 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10853-021-06391-2

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