Controllable synthesis of a hybrid mesoporous sheets-like Fe0.5NiS2@ P, N-doped carbon electrocatalyst for alkaline oxygen evolution reaction.

Owing to the high cost of precious metal catalysts for the oxygen evolution reaction (OER), the production of highly efficient and affordable electrocatalysts is important for generating pollution-free and renewable energy via electrochemical processes. A facile hydrothermal approach was employed to synthesize hybrid mesoporous iron-nickel bimetallic sulfides @ P, N-doped carbon for the OER. The prepared Fe0.5NiS2@C exhibited an overpotential (η) of 250 mV at 10 mA/cm2. This exceeded the overpotentials recently reported for surface-modified P, N-doped carbon-based catalysts for the OER in a 1 M KOH medium. Moreover, the Fe0.5NiS2@C catalyst showed a notable Tafel slope of 90.5 mV/dec with long-dated stability even after 24 h at 10 mA/cm2. The superior OER performance of the Fe0.5NiS2@C catalysts may be due to their large surface area, sheet-like morphology with abundant active sites, fast transfer of mass and electrons, control of the electronic structure by co-treatment with heteroatoms (e.g., P and N), and the synergistic effect of bimetallic sulfides, making them favorable catalysts for the oxygen evolution reaction. Density functional theory (DFT) calculations showed that the Fe0.5NiS2@C catalyst exhibited strong H2O-adsorption energy. The enhanced OER activity of Fe0.5NiS2@C was attributed to its higher surface area, favorable H2O adsorption energy, improved electron transfer efficiency, and lower Gibbs free energy compared to those of the other proposed catalysts.