A highly stable and efficient electrodeposited flowered like structure Ni–Co alloy on steel substrate for electrocatalytic hydrogen evolution reaction in HCl solution

Abstract

Ni–Co alloy of flowered like structure is successfully electrodeposited from neutral aqueous solutions of NiCl2 and CoCl2 salts as precursors at room temperature. The prepared alloy at our optimized conditions has a high protection effect from the electrochemical corrosion of steel in the hydrochloric acid solution. The electrochemically deposited alloys are examined via X-ray diffraction (XRD) giving two main phases of (fcc) and (hcp). The morphology is investigated via scanning electron microscope (SEM) showing flowered like structure for the alloy that is electrodeposited at −1.0V only. The obtained data of the potentiodynamic polarization (PDP) and spectroscopy of electrochemical impedance (EIS) demonstrates that Ni–Co coatings have high stability in the highly corrosive media, especially the alloy of the flowered like structure. This alloy of unique properties is subjected to be an efficacious electrocatalyst for the reaction of hydrogen evolution (HER) in HCl solution.