Electrocatalytic Activity Of Non Platinum Composite Catalysts Based On Carbon To Hydrogen Evolution Reaction

Hydrogen is a kind of clean, efficient and recyclable material, which can be transformed into effective energy without environmental pollution. In many methods of hydrogen production, hydrogen production by electrolysis is the most convenient, the most cheap, and the most clean method, but because of the existence of hydrogen evolution, the energy consumption is increased. The effective hydrogen evolution electrode material should have the characteristics such as good electrical conductivity, low potential of hydrogen evolution, high electrocatalytic activity and good electrochemical stability. In order to improve the electrocatalytic activity of the cathode, the electrode surface was designed and modified, and the surface of the catalyst modified electrode was used. Pt catalyst(Pt/C) is considered as the best catalyst for hydrogen evolution reaction at present. But the high cost and limited reserves limit the wide application of Pt catalyst. As a result, the study of non Pt cathode catalyst has received more and more attention. In this thesis, we have prepared two kinds of non platinum composite catalysts.1) CoO/N-G was prepared by a microwave assisted ethylene glycol reduction method to deposit nano cobalt oxide particles on the surface of graphene. Then it was mixed with melamine and heat treatment at different temperatures in N2 atmosphere. The results show that the CoO particles are uniformly distributed in the folded graphene surface at 600 ℃,the nitrogen content of graphene is 8.6%, and the catalytic activity of the catalyst is the highest. Kinetic parameters obtained from Tafel curves exhibited small initial potential,small Tafel slope, big exchange current density, and high electrochemical stability. It was a kind of non platinum catalyst of effective catalytic to hydrogen evolution reaction. Also it had higher catalytic activity to hydrogen evolution reaction than CoO/N-C, which was prepared by the same method of the traditional carbon black(Vulcan XC-72) as the carrier.2) Mo2C/C was prepared using traditional carbon black(Vulcan XC-72) and metal molybdenum powder under the condition of high temperature at 870 ℃ and nitrogen protection to deposited molybdenum carbide on the surface of carbon black. The resultsshow that the obtained samples with Mo2 C layer is wrapped in the carbon black particles and core-shell structure carbon acted not only as a carrier material, but also as the carbon source for the synthesis of composite. Mo2C/C non platinum catalyst had good catalytic activity to hydrogen evolution reaction through the kinetic study obtained from the Tafel curves.