Nickel-carbonate nanowire array: An efficient and durable electrocatalyst for water oxidation under nearly neutral conditions

It is highly attractive but still remains a great challenge to develop an efficient electrocatalyst for oxygen evolution reaction under nearly neutral conditions. In this work, we report the transformation of Ni3S2 nanowire array on nickel foam into the amorphous nickel carbonate nanowire array on nickel foam (NiCO3/NF). The resulting NiCO3/NF shows high electrocatalytic activity towards water oxidation and affords current density of 50 mA∙cm‒2 at overpotential of 395 mV in 1.0 mol∙L‒1 KHCO3. Moreover, this NiCO3/NF is also durable with a long-term electrochemical durability of 60 h. This catalyst electrode achieves a high turnover frequency of 0.21 mol O2∙s‒1 at the overpotential of 500 mV.