Nickel oxide nanoparticles dispersed on biomass–derived amorphous carbon/cobalt silicate support accelerate the oxygen evolution reaction

The development of robust, low-cost and efficient oxygen evolution reaction (OER) electrocatalysts, especially non-noble-metal-based OER catalysts, is of great significance and imperative to address the energy crisis, but remain challenging. Herein, a biomass-derived three-dimensional (3D) porous carbon/cobalt silicate (C/Co2SiO4) architecture is developed as a support for loading nickel oxide (NiOx) species to prepare an earth-abundant and non-noble-metal-based NiOx/C/Co2SiO4 electrocatalyst. The NiOx nanoparticles are dispersed on 3D C/Co2SiO4 support and the introduction of NiOx species improves the OER active sites and shows the bimetal (Co, Ni) synergetic effect. The NiOx/C/Co2SiO4 electrocatalyst exhibits the overpotential with 355 mV at 10 mA cm-2, Tafel slope with 40 mV dec-1 and large electrochemical active surface areas (ECSA), which are superior to C/Co2SiO4 support and NiOx. The catalytic properties achieved herein are superior or comparable to most transition metal oxides/hydroxides. The findings reveal that the introduction of NiOx nanoparticles can greatly boost the OER property of C/Co2SiO4 support. This work not only develops a non-noble-metal-based NiOx/C/Co2SiO4 catalyst, but also verifies that the introduction of metal oxide species on biomass-derived 3D C/Co2SiO4 provides a new horizon to explore economical, high-efficient and robust OER catalysts.