Solar-driven, highly sustained splitting of seawater into hydrogen and oxygen fuels

Electrolysis of water to generate hydrogen fuel is an attractive renewable energy storage technology. However, grid-scale fresh-water electrolysis would put a heavy strain on vital water resources. Developing cheap electrocatalysts and electrodes that can sustain seawater splitting without chloride...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - PNAS 2019-04, Vol.116 (14), p.6624-6629
Main Authors: Kuang, Yun, Kenney, Michael J., Meng, Yongtao, Hung, Wei-Hsuan, Liu, Yijin, Huang, Jianan Erick, Prasanna, Rohit, Li, Pengsong, Li, Yaping, Wang, Lei, Lin, Meng-Chang, McGehee, Michael D., Sun, Xiaoming, Dai, Hongjie
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
08 HYDROGEN
Anodes
Anodizing
anticorrosion
Catalysis
Catalytic activity
Chlorides
Corrosion
Corrosion resistance
Drawing and ironing
electrocatalysis
Electrocatalysts
Electrolysis
Energy storage
Hydrogen fuels
hydrogen production
Intermetallic compounds
Iron compounds
Metal foams
Multilayers
Nickel
Nickel compounds
Nickel sulfide
Oxidation
Oxygen
Oxygen evolution reactions
Physical Sciences
Renewable energy
Seawater
seawater splitting
solar driven
SOLAR ENERGY
Splitting
Sulfates
Sulfides
Water currents
Water resistance
Water resources
Water scarcity
Water splitting
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Electrolysis of water to generate hydrogen fuel is an attractive renewable energy storage technology. However, grid-scale fresh-water electrolysis would put a heavy strain on vital water resources. Developing cheap electrocatalysts and electrodes that can sustain seawater splitting without chloride corrosion could address the water scarcity issue. Here we present a multilayer anode consisting of a nickel–iron hydroxide (NiFe) electrocatalyst layer uniformly coated on a nickel sulfide (NiSx) layer formed on porous Ni foam (NiFe/NiSx-Ni), affording superior catalytic activity and corrosion resistance in solar-driven alkaline seawater electrolysis operating at industrially required current densities (0.4 to 1 A/cm²) over 1,000 h. A continuous, highly oxygen evolution reactionactive NiFe electrocatalyst layer drawing anodic currents toward water oxidation and an in situ-generated polyatomic sulfate and carbonate-rich passivating layers formed in the anode are responsible for chloride repelling and superior corrosion resistance of the salty-water-splitting anode.
ISSN:0027-8424
1091-6490
DOI:10.1073/pnas.1900556116