Preparation And Properties Of Non-noble Metal Film On Nickel Foam Electrodes For Hydrogen Evolution Reaction

Hydrogen, a clean renewable energy, will be widely used as the nextgeneration of energy carriers after the common energy sources such aspetroleum, coal and natural gas and other non-renewable. Nickel foam (NF) is atypical kind of commercially three-dimensional (3D) metallic functionalmaterial with interconnected skeleton-pore structure, which has been widelyused in many fields including nickel-hydride battery electrode and fuel cells.Such material has a large electrochemical reaction interface, with great potentialapplications in the aspect of electrochemical hydrogen evolution electrode.With commercial nickel foam as the support, we carefully investigated theinfluence of microstructure and chemical composition of nickel foam modifiedwith suitable thickness of Ni, Cu and/or Co metal films on their electro-catalyticactivities for hydrogen evolution reaction in alkaline media. Furthermore, theeffect of annealing treatment on the microstructure and hydrogen evolutionactivity of the nickel foam supported multicomponent modified layers was alsoexplored. The main results are as follows:1. Under different current densities (0.01,0.03,0.05A/cm2), the Cu modified layer was deposited on the surface of three-dimensional nickel foam within afixed duration in the Cu plating solution. The result shows that different Cucoverage was coated on the nickel foam surface. However, the electro-catalyticactivity of these Cu-modified electrode for hydrogen evolution reaction is worsethan that of pure nickel foam. The hydrogen evolution reaction activity obeysthe sequence: NF> NF/Cu0.01> NF/Cu0.03> NF/Cu0.05.2. Under different current densities (0.01,0.03,0.05A/cm2), the Co modifiedlayer was deposited on the surface of three-dimensional nickel foam within afixed duration in the Co plating solution. The result shows that different Cocoverage was coated on the nickel foam surface. Different from that of Cumodified layer, it is found that, with increasing of the deposition currentdensities, the electro-catalytic activity for hydrogen evolution reaction followsthe sequence NF/Co0.05> NF> NF/Co0.03> NF/Co0.01.3. Under different current densities (0.01,0.03,0.05A/cm2), the Ni modifiedlayer was deposited on the surface of three-dimensional nickel foam within afixed duration in the Ni plating solution. The result shows that the best modifiedelectrode for electro-catalytic activity toward hydrogen evolution reaction isobtained at the middle range within the applied electrodeposition currentdensities and the sequence follows NF/Ni0.03> NF/Ni0.05> NF> NF/Ni0.01.4. Using the modified NF/Cu0.01electrode as the support, we further modifythe Co or Ni film onto the surface under different electrodeposition currentdensities. The cyclic voltammetry and polarization test results show the cathode NF/Cu0.01/Co0.05showed much better activity and stability for hydrogenevolution reaction among these multi-layered electrodes.5. Using the modified NF/Cu0.01electrode as the support, cobalt/nickelwere electrodeposited at different current densities. After that, these sampleswere annealed at different temperatures (100,300,500℃) for different periods(1,3,5h). We found that the as-received cathode NF/Cu0.01Ni0.01annealed at300℃for3h exhibits the best performance for hydrogen evolution reaction.