Crystalline-Amorphous Ni2 P4 O12 /NiMoOx Nanoarrays for Alkaline Water Electrolysis: Enhanced Catalytic Activity via In Situ Surface Reconstruction.

Abstract

Water electrolysis affords a promising approach to large-scale hydrogen yield, but its efficiency is restrained by the sluggish water dissociation kinetics. Here, an efficient bifunctional electrocatalyst of in situ formed crystalline nickel metaphosphate on amorphous NiMoOx nanoarrays supported on nickel foam (c-Ni2 P4 O12 /a-NiMoOx /NF) for both hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) and oxygen evolution reaction (OER) in alkaline solution is reported. The c-Ni2 P4 O12 /a-NiMoOx /NF can deliver a current density of 10mA cm-2 at a low potential of 78mV for HER, and a current density of 20mA cm-2 at an overpotential of 250mV for OER. Moreover, it only requires a small cell voltage of 1.55V at 10mA cm-2 for robust water splitting with outstanding long-term durability over 84 h. Various spectroscopic studies reveal that in situ surface reconstruction is crucial for the enhanced catalytic activity, where c-Ni2 P4 O12 /a-NiMoOx is transformed into c-Ni2 P4 O12 /a-NiMoO4 during the HER process, and into c-Ni2 P4 O12 /a-NiOOH in the OER process. This work may provide a new strategy for uncovering the catalytic mechanism of crystalline-amorphous catalysts.