Phytic-acid-doped conductive hydrogels as alkaline seawater electrocatalysts with anomalous chloride promoted oxygen evolution reaction

Abstract

The side reaction mainly caused by chloride ions in seawater is the key bottleneck restricting the development of efficient and stable oxygen evolution reaction (OER) electrocatalysts for direct seawater splitting. Recent researches on OER catalysts in seawater mostly concentrate on the repulsive force of Cl− to reduce its adverse impact. Here, we verified that Cl− doping into phytic acid based polypyrrole conductive hydrogel has no significant negative effect; On the contrary, it is beneficial to enhance its activity in seawater. A series of characterization techniques show that doping Cl in the polypyrrole conductive hydrogel can improve the conductivity and promote the electron transfer in the OER process. Therefore, we achieved direct alkaline seawater electrolysis using a non-metallic PA-PPy/CP anode in an alkaline electrolysis cell.