Spontaneous Alkaline Water Electrolysis Driven by the “OH-Baton”

Zhi Liu, Jin Yang, Yuanyuan Yan, Yongqiang Feng, Meiling Wang*, Xiaomin Wang*, Guanjun Chen*, Jiadong Zhou*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

Nano-metal particles integrating with single-atom catalysts (NMP-SACs) have been constructed recently for accelerated alkaline hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). However, the design of NMP-SACs primarily aims at the separate adsorption of *OH and H*, while neglecting the *OH desorption, causing *OH blockage and slow kinetics. To address this, Mo2C is introduced to NMP-SACs (e.g., Pt nanoparticles-Pt atom, Ptn-Pt1) by a “one-step dual-confinement pyrolysis” strategy for Ptn-Pt1@Mo2C, where Pt1 precisely confined by Mo2C with Ptn remaining adjacent to Pt1@Mo2C. Experiments and calculations demonstrate that Mo2C acting as an “OH-baton” helps overcome *OH blockage on Pt1, accelerating the separation of H* and *OH and thus promoting spontaneous alkaline water dissociation. Thus, the supported Ptn-Pt1@Mo2C achieves a significantly lower overpotential (η10 = 24 mV) and a more than seven times higher mass activity (MA100 = 4.33 mA µg Pt⁻1) than Ptn-Pt1 in alkaline. The alkaline anion-exchange membrane water electrolyzer (AEMWE) delivers a low cell voltage of 1.91 V and durable 120 h of electrolysis at 1.0 A cm−2. This work proposes a new insight for introducing an “OH-baton” in a dual-site catalyst system to achieve spontaneous alkaline water dissociation.

Original languageEnglish
JournalAdvanced Functional Materials
DOIs
Publication statusAccepted/In press - 2025
Externally publishedYes

Keywords

  • Alkaline hydrogen evolution
  • NMP-SACs (Pt-Pt)
  • OH-baton
  • spontaneous HO dissociation

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