Abstract
The development of robust electrocatalysts with low platinum content for acidic hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) is paramount for large scale commercialization of proton exchange membrane electrolyzers. Herein, a simple strategy is reported to synthesize a well anchored, low Pt containing Vulcan carbon catalyst using ZnO as a sacrificial template. Pt containing ZnO (PZ) is prepared by a simultaneous borohydride reduction. PZ is then loaded onto Vulcan carbon to produce a very low Pt content electrocatalyst, PZ@VC. PZ@VC with 2wt.% Pt shows excellent performance for acidic HER in comparison to the commercial Pt/C (20wt.%) catalyst. PZ@VC with a very low Pt loading shows significantly low η10 and η100 values (15 and 46mV, respectively). PZ@VC on coating with Nafion (PZ@VC-N) shows further improvement in its performance (η10 of 7mV, η100 of 28mV) with ≈300h of stability (≈10mA cm-2 ) with only 4 µgPt cm-2 . PZ@VC-N shows a record high mass activity of 71 A mgPt -1 (32 times larger than Pt/C (20 wt.%) at 50mV of overpotential. Post reaction characterizations reveal Pt nanoparticles are embedded onto VC with no traces of zinc, suggestive of a strong metal-support interaction leading to this high stability at low Pt loading.
Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
