Nickel–Cobalt Selenide Electrocatalytic Electrode toward Glucose Oxidation Coupling with Alkaline Hydrogen Production
Xinxuan Lin, Hui Zhong, Wei Hu, Jing Du
Abstract
Electrochemical glucose oxidation reaction (GOR) is a promising alternative anodic reaction to water oxidation reaction for various electrochemical oxidation reactions owing to the relatively low thermodynamic potential of GOR and the abundant source of glucose from biomass-based platform molecules. However, it remains difficult to develop high-activity and low-cost electrocatalysts toward GOR. Herein, we report a NiCoSe x nanoplate supported on Ni foam with excellent activity for GOR electrocatalysis, which achieves a high current density of 500 mA cm –2 at 1.41 V vs reversible hydrogen electrode (RHE) and a 70.2% Faraday efficiency of formate at 1.40 V vs RHE. The surface component evolution of NiCoSe x is studied by an in situ Raman spectrum, which points out the catalytic active species to be CoO x /CoOOH and NiOOH. Furthermore, we develop a two-electrode cell by pairing GOR with hydrogen evolution reaction using the NiCoSe x electrode as the bifunctional catalyst for the anode and the cathode, which only requires an applied voltage of 1.50 V to reach a high current density of 200 mA cm –2 and retains long-term stability over 18 h with a high Faraday efficiency of H 2 (close to 100%) in the cathode.