Development of Cu3N electrocatalyst for hydrogen evolution reaction in alkaline medium

Aparna Sajeev; Aleena Mary Paul; Ravi Nivetha; Kannan Gothandapani; Tamil Selvi Gopal; George Jacob; Muthumareeswaran Muthuramamoorty; Saravanan Pandiaraj; Abdullah Alodhayb; Soo Young Kim; Quyet Van Le; Pau Loke Show; Soon Kwan Jeong; Andrews Nirmala Grace

doi:10.1038/s41598-022-05953-x

Development of Cu₃N electrocatalyst for hydrogen evolution reaction in alkaline medium

Sci Rep. 2022 Feb 7;12(1):2004. doi: 10.1038/s41598-022-05953-x.

Affiliations

¹ Centre for Nanotechnology Research, Vellore Institute of Technology, Vellore, India.
² Centre for Nanotechnology Research, Vellore Institute of Technology, Vellore, India. georgejacobn@gmail.com.
³ College of Science, King Saud University, P. O. Box 2455, Riyadh, 11451, Saudi Arabia.
⁴ Department of Self Development Skills, CFY Deanship, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
⁵ Department of Physics and Astronomy, College of Science, King Saud University, P. O. Box 2455, Riyadh, 11451, Saudi Arabia.
⁶ Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Institute of Green Manufacturing Technology, Korea University, 145, Anam-ro Seongbuk-gu, Seoul, 02841, South Korea. sooyoungkim@korea.ac.kr.
⁷ Institute of Research and Development, Duy Tan University, Da Nang, 550000, Vietnam. levanquyet@dtu.edu.vn.
⁸ Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Science and Engineering, University of Nottingham Malaysia, Jalan Broga, 43500, Semenyih, Selangor Darul Ehsan, Malaysia.
⁹ Climate Change Technology Research Division, Korea Institute of Energy Research, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon, 305-343, South Korea. jeongsk3623@gmail.com.
¹⁰ Centre for Nanotechnology Research, Vellore Institute of Technology, Vellore, India. anirmalagrace@vit.ac.in.

Abstract

A wide variety of electrocatalysts has been evolved for hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) and it is reasonable to carry out HER with low cost electrocatalyst and a good efficiency. In this study, Cu₃N was synthesized by nitridation of Cu₂O and further utilized as an electrocatalyst towards HER. The developed Cu₃N electrocatalyst was tested and results showed a low overpotential and moderate Tafel slope value (overpotential: 149.18 mV and Tafel slope 63.28 mV/dec at 10 mA/cm²) in alkaline medium with a charge transfer resistance value as calculated from electrochemical impendence spectroscopy being 1.44 Ω. Further from the experimental results, it was observed that the reaction kinetics was governed by Volmer-Heyrovsky mechanism. Moreover, Cu₃N has shown an improved rate of electron transfer and enhanced accessible active sites, due to its structural properties and electrical conductivity. Thus the overall results show an excellent electrochemical performance, leading to a new pathway for the synthesis of low cost electrocatalyst for energy conversion and storage.