scholarly journals Photocatalytic overall water splitting under visible light enabled by a particulate conjugated polymer loaded with iridium

Author(s):  
Yang Bai ◽  
Chao Li ◽  
Lunjie Liu ◽  
Yuichi Yamaguchi ◽  
Bahri Mounib ◽  
...  

The production of hydrogen from water via solar water splitting is a potential method to overcome the intermittency of the Sun’s energy by storing it as a chemical fuel. Inorganic semiconductors have been studied extensively as photocatalysts for overall water splitting, but polymer photocatalysts are also receiving growing attention. So far, most studies involving organic polymers report hydrogen production with sacrificial electron donors, which is unsuitable for large-scale hydrogen energy production. Here we show that a linear conjugated polymer photocatalyst can be used for overall water splitting to produce stoichiometric amounts of H2 and O2. We studied a range of different metal co-catalysts in conjunction with the linear polymer photocatalyst, the homopolymer of dibenzo[b,d]thiophene sulfone (P10). Photocatalytic activity was observed for palladium/iridium oxide-loaded P10, while other co-catalysts resulted in materials that showed no activity for overall water splitting. The reaction conditions were further optimized and the overall water splitting using the IrO2-loaded P10 was found to proceed steadily for an extended period (>60 hours) after the system stabilized. These results demonstrate that conjugated polymers can act as single component photocatalytic systems for overall water splitting when loaded with suitable co-catalysts, albeit currently with low activities. Significantly, though, organic polymers can be designed to absorb a large fraction of the visible spectrum, which can be challenging with inorganic catalysts. Transient spectroscopy shows that the IrO2 co-catalyst plays an important role in the generation of the charge separated state required for water splitting, with evidence for fast hole transfer to the co-catalyst. This solid-state approach should be transferable to other polymer photocatalysts, allowing this field to move away from sacrificial hydrogen production towards overall water splitting.

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (32) ◽  
pp. 16283-16290 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yang Bai ◽  
Keita Nakagawa ◽  
Alexander J. Cowan ◽  
Catherine M. Aitchison ◽  
Yuichi Yamaguchi ◽  
...  

A Z-scheme of a linear conjugated polymer photocatalyst and a metal oxide is able to facilitate overall water splitting without non-scalable sacrificial reagents showing potential for sustainable hydrogen production.


2018 ◽  
Vol 22 (Suppl. 2) ◽  
pp. 709-718
Author(s):  
Ziming Cheng ◽  
Ruitian Yu ◽  
Fuqiang Wang ◽  
Huaxu Liang ◽  
Bo Lin ◽  
...  

Hydrogen production from water using a catalyst and solar energy was an ideal future fuel source. In this study, an elaborate experimental test rig of hydrogen production from solar water splitting was designed and established with self- controlled temperature system. The effects of light intensity on the reaction rate of hydrogen production from solar water splitting were experimentally investigated with the consideration of optical losses, reaction temperature, and photocatalysts powder cluster. Besides, a revised expression of full-spectrum solar-to-hydrogen energy conversion efficiency with the consideration of optical losses was also put forward, which can be more accurate to evaluate the full-spectrum solar-to-hydrogen energy of photo-catalysts powders. The results indicated that optical losses of solar water splitting reactor increased with the increase of the incoming light intensity, and the hydrogen production rate increased linearly with the increase of effective light intensity even at higher light intensity region when the optical losses of solar water splitting reactor were considered.


MRS Advances ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 1 (59) ◽  
pp. 3923-3927
Author(s):  
Philip Kalisman ◽  
Lilac Amirav

ABSTRACTThe production of hydrogen by photocatalytic water splitting is a potentially clean and renewable source for hydrogen fuel. Cadmium chalcogenides are attractive photocatalysts because they have the potential to convert water into hydrogen and oxygen using photons in the visible spectrum. Cadmium sulfide rods with embedded cadmium selenide quantum dots (CdSe@CdS) are particularly attractive because of their high molar absorptivity in the UV-blue spectral region, and their energy bands can be tuned; however, two crucial drawbacks hinder the implementation of these materials in wide spread use: poor charge transfer and photochemical instability.Utilizing photochemical deposition of co-catalysts onto CdSe@CdS substrates we can address each of these weaknesses. We report how novel co-catalyst morphologies can greatly increase efficiency for the water reduction half-reaction. We also report photostability for CdSe@CdS under high intensity 455nm light (a wavelength at which photocatalytic water splitting by CdSe@CdS is possible) by growing metal oxide co-catalysts on the surface of our rods.


Nanoscale ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dongxue Yao ◽  
Lingling Gu ◽  
Bin Zuo ◽  
Shuo Weng ◽  
Shengwei Deng ◽  
...  

The technology of electrolyzing water to prepare high-purity hydrogen is an important field in today's energy development. However, how to prepare efficient, stable, and inexpensive hydrogen production technology from electrolyzed...


2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Shan Wang ◽  
Aolin Lu ◽  
Chuan-Jian Zhong

AbstractAs a promising substitute for fossil fuels, hydrogen has emerged as a clean and renewable energy. A key challenge is the efficient production of hydrogen to meet the commercial-scale demand of hydrogen. Water splitting electrolysis is a promising pathway to achieve the efficient hydrogen production in terms of energy conversion and storage in which catalysis or electrocatalysis plays a critical role. The development of active, stable, and low-cost catalysts or electrocatalysts is an essential prerequisite for achieving the desired electrocatalytic hydrogen production from water splitting for practical use, which constitutes the central focus of this review. It will start with an introduction of the water splitting performance evaluation of various electrocatalysts in terms of activity, stability, and efficiency. This will be followed by outlining current knowledge on the two half-cell reactions, hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) and oxygen evolution reaction (OER), in terms of reaction mechanisms in alkaline and acidic media. Recent advances in the design and preparation of nanostructured noble-metal and non-noble metal-based electrocatalysts will be discussed. New strategies and insights in exploring the synergistic structure, morphology, composition, and active sites of the nanostructured electrocatalysts for increasing the electrocatalytic activity and stability in HER and OER will be highlighted. Finally, future challenges and perspectives in the design of active and robust electrocatalysts for HER and OER towards efficient production of hydrogen from water splitting electrolysis will also be outlined.


2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Xixi Ji ◽  
Yanhong Lin ◽  
Jie Zeng ◽  
Zhonghua Ren ◽  
Zijia Lin ◽  
...  

AbstractDevelopment of excellent and cheap electrocatalysts for water electrolysis is of great significance for application of hydrogen energy. Here, we show a highly efficient and stable oxygen evolution reaction (OER) catalyst with multilayer-stacked hybrid structure, in which vertical graphene nanosheets (VGSs), MoS2 nanosheets, and layered FeCoNi hydroxides (FeCoNi(OH)x) are successively grown on carbon fibers (CF/VGSs/MoS2/FeCoNi(OH)x). The catalyst exhibits excellent OER performance with a low overpotential of 225 and 241 mV to attain 500 and 1000 mA cm−2 and small Tafel slope of 29.2 mV dec−1. Theoretical calculation indicates that compositing of FeCoNi(OH)x with MoS2 could generate favorable electronic structure and decrease the OER overpotential, promoting the electrocatalytic activity. An alkaline water electrolyzer is established using CF/VGSs/MoS2/FeCoNi(OH)x anode for overall water splitting, which generates a current density of 100 mA cm−2 at 1.59 V with excellent stability over 100 h. Our highly efficient catalysts have great prospect for water electrolysis.


Author(s):  
Baojun Ma ◽  
Yuying Dang ◽  
Dekang Li ◽  
Xiaoyan Wang ◽  
Keying Lin ◽  
...  

Nanomaterials ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (12) ◽  
pp. 2572
Author(s):  
Yanfei Fan ◽  
Yan Liu ◽  
Hongyu Cui ◽  
Wen Wang ◽  
Qiaoyan Shang ◽  
...  

Strontium Titanate has a typical perovskite structure with advantages of low cost and photochemical stability. However, the wide bandgap and rapid recombination of electrons and holes limited its application in photocatalysis. In this work, a SrTiO3 material with surface oxygen vacancies was synthesized via carbon reduction under a high temperature. It was successfully applied for photocatalytic overall water splitting to produce clean hydrogen energy under visible light irradiation without any sacrificial reagent for the first time. The photocatalytic overall water splitting ability of the as-prepared SrTiO3-C950 is attributed to the surface oxygen vacancies that can make suitable energy levels for visible light response, improving the separation and transfer efficiency of photogenerated carriers.


Author(s):  
Kai Chang ◽  
Duy Thanh Tran ◽  
Jingqiang Wang ◽  
Nam Hoon Kim ◽  
Joong Hee Lee

Designing an earth-abundant electrode material with high activity and durability is a major challenge for water splitting to produce clean and green hydrogen energy. In this study, we reported a...


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