Fabrication of porous Cu supported Ni-P/CeO2 composite coatings for enhanced hydrogen evolution reaction in alkaline solution

Cost-effective electrodes with high activity for hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) and durability are required to develop clean and renewable hydrogen energy. In this work, a porous Cu supported Ni-P/CeO2 composite coating was fabricated by a facile electrodeposition technique. Owing to the contribution from the 3D porous Cu support and the incorporating agglomeration-free and uniformly distributed CeO2 particles into the Ni-P matrix, the optimal composite coating (porous Cu supported Ni-P/CeO2 (20 g L-1)) exhibits outstanding electrocatalytic performance with small overpotentials (η) of 118 and 320 mV at a cathodic current density of 10 and 100 mA cm2. Moreover, the composite electrode also presents excellent electrochemical stability in the alkaline solution. This work provides a feasible option to fabricate composite electrodes that may have desirable electrochemical properties for HER.