Highly efficient nanoporous CoBP electrocatalyst for hydrogen evolution reaction

Water splitting is an environment friendly and efficient way to produce hydrogen.Highly efficient and low-cost non-noble metal catalysts play an important role in hydrogen evolution reaction(HER).Dealloying is a simple method to prepare three-dimensional self-supporting nanoporous materials without conductive supports and binders.In this work,we prepared self-supporting nanoporous CoBP electrocatalyst by dealloying method.The influence of the synergistic effect of nonmetallic elements on catalytic activity was investigated.The synergistic electronic effect of Co,B and P atoms on the surface optimizes the H atoms desorption and results in superior HER activity.The bi-continuous structure of nanoporous CoBP provides more active area and favors of electron and electrolyte transfer.The nanoporous CoBP with the B/P atomic ratio of 1/3 exhibits low overpotential of 42 mV at 10 mA·cm-2,small Tafel slope of 39.8 mV·dec-1and good long-term stability with no performance decrease for 20 h in alkaline solution.