Biphasic Transition Metal Nitride Electrode Promotes Nucleophile Oxidation Reaction for Practicable Hybrid Water Electrocatalysis
Yin Zhu, Qizhu Qian, Yanxu Chen, Xiaoyue He, Xingwei Shi, Wentao Wang, Ziyun Li, Yafei Feng, Genqiang Zhang, Fangyi Cheng
Abstract
Abstract Glycerol electrooxidation (GOR), as a typical nucleophile oxidation reaction, is deemed as a promising alternative anodic route to assist cathodic hydrogen evolution reaction. However, the investigations of high‐performance catalysts and industrial‐scale application of GOR remain a grand challenge. Herein, biphasic Ni 3 N/Co 3 N heterostructure nanowires (denoted as Ni 3 N/Co 3 N‐NWs) are proposed as an efficient bifunctional catalyst, which realizes a high Faradaic efficiency of 94.6% toward formate production. Importantly, the flow electrolyzer achieves an industry‐level current density of 1 A cm −2 at 2.01 V with impressive stability for steady running over 200 h, realizing lower electricity expense of 4.82 kWh m −3 H2 and energy saving efficiency of 9.7%, as well as outstanding co‐production rates of 11 and 21.4 mmol cm −2 h −1 toward formate and H 2 , respectively. Theoretical calculations reveal that the efficient electron transfer on Ni 3 N/Co 3 N heterointerfaces simultaneously optimizes nucleophile reaction tendency and glycerol dehydrogenation kinetics, thus contributing to excellent GOR performance.