Designing high performance overall water splitting electrocatalysts from non-precious metal selenides

“The energy production has been depending mostly on fossil fuel which will be depleted someday in the near future. Aspects such as the loss of energy resources and destruction of the environment have motivated researchers for pursuing transition away from fossil fuels to renewable solar-fuels. Therefore, in order to meet the continuous increasing demand for energy, the hydrogen, with the largest energy density stored in it, can then efficiently be used in fuel cells without concern of contaminants. Water splitting reaction to generate H2 and O2 is one promising method of converting solar energy into fuels. The major challenge with this technology is the sluggish anodic reaction, oxygen evolution reaction (OER), in combination with the harsh conditions require special catalyst materials to mediate and expedite the reaction process. Mixed precious iridium-ruthenium oxides have been investigated as promising electrocatalysts for the OER. Lately first row transition metal chalcogenides have experienced an improving attention for hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). Over the course of the past two and half years, we have designed, synthesized and evaluated a series of heterogeneous water splitting catalysts based on non-precious transition metal selenides. Facile fabrication protocol of first-row transition metal selenides has been accomplished efficiently. These first-row transition metal selenides have not been widely investigated for OER till now. Therefore, their potential for electrocatalytic water splitting has not been fully explored, and much remains to be done here. The aim of this thesis was mainly to study the water splitting in particular OER with different electrocatalysts, and to investigate how the composition and structure of these catalysts influenced their catalytic performance”--Abstract, page iv