Highly catalytic flexible RuO2 on carbon fiber cloth network for boosting chlorine evolution reaction

Abstract

In this study, a novel flexible electrode consisting of homogeneous RuO2 nanoparticles (NPs) wrapped around the carbon fiber cloth (CC) is fabricated by combining the cathodic electro-deposition in the aqueous acidic RuCl3·xH2O solution and annealing in air atmosphere. The as-fabricated RuO2 NPs/CC electrode with electro-deposition duration of 10 min demonstrates a superior electrocatalytic activity with a lower overpotential of ca. 1.05 V vs. SCE and its current density reaches up to 175 mA cm−2 at 1.2 V vs. SCE for chlorine evolution reaction (CER) in 5.0 M NaCl aqueous solution, outperforming many of the reported counterparts. The as-revealed outstanding electrocatalytic activity should be attributed to several beneficial factors such as its typical integrated binder-free 3D architecture, higher usage efficiency of active RuO2 NPs, greatly decreased interfacial resistance, etc. This work paves a way to utilize the carbon fiber cloth decorated with active noble metal oxides for boosting electrochemical Cl2 production.