CeO2-Ni2Co1Sex catalysts grown on N-doped carbon substrates for electrocatalytic oxidation of methanol and urea

Methanol or urea electrolysis provides the foreground of more economical and energy-efficient hydrogen production, while alleviating the pollution of methanol-rich or urea-rich wastewater, which is also critical to solving environmental problems. Efficient and inexpensive electrocatalysts designed for methanol oxidation reactions (MOR) and urea oxidation reactions (UOR) can not only alleviate energy crisis, but also solve the problem of water pollution. In this article, it developed a cobalt selenide/nickel selenide hybrid nanosheet array modified with cerium dioxide on an N-doped C substrate by a simple salt template assisted technology. The catalyst ratio and selenisation temperature were varied in order to obtain CeO2-Ni2Co1Sex-NC-450, which was produced at selenisation temperature of 450 degrees C with the Ni, Co ratio of 2:1. This sample exhibited the most favourable MOR and UOR properties. CeO2-Ni2Co1Sex-NC-450 has the best performance on MOR (maximum current density similar to 175 mA cm(-2), oxidation potential of 1.291 V at 10 mA cm(-2)) and UOR (maximum current density similar to 130 mA cm(-2), oxidation potential of 1.294 V at 10 mA cm(-2)). This study is crucial for replacing expensive precious metals with inexpensive and easily obtainable transition metals, as well as creating effective anodic oxidation electrocatalysts to reduce water pollution caused by methanol and urea.