<p><i>Operando</i> spectroelectrochemical analysis is used to determine the water oxidation reaction kinetics for hematite photoanodes prepared using four different synthetic procedures. Whilst these photoanodes exhibit very different current / voltage performance, their underlying water oxidation kinetics are found to be almost invariant. Lower photoanode performance was found to correlate with the observation of optical signals indicative of charge accumulation in mid-gap oxygen vacancy states, indicating these states do not contribute directly to water oxidation.</p>
Water Oxidation Kinetics of Accumulated Holes on the Surface of a TiO2 Photoanode: A Rate Law Analysis