How Acid Washing Nickel Foam Substrates Improves the Efficiency of the Alkaline Hydrogen Evolution Reaction

Thomas B. Ferriday (), Suhas Nuggehalli Sampathkumar, Peter Hugh Middleton, Jan Van Herle and Mohan Lal Kolhe
Additional contact information
Thomas B. Ferriday: Department of Engineering Science, University of Agder, NO-4879 Grimstad, Norway
Suhas Nuggehalli Sampathkumar: Group of Energy Materials, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Lausanne (EPFL), 1951 Sion, Switzerland
Peter Hugh Middleton: Department of Engineering Science, University of Agder, NO-4879 Grimstad, Norway
Jan Van Herle: Group of Energy Materials, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Lausanne (EPFL), 1951 Sion, Switzerland
Mohan Lal Kolhe: Department of Engineering Science, University of Agder, NO-4879 Grimstad, Norway

Energies, 2023, vol. 16, issue 5, 1-9

Abstract: Nickel foam substrates are frequently utilised as porous 3D substrates for renewable energy applications. The preparation of these substrates usually includes an acid-washing step, but the degree to which this step affects the final electrochemical performance after spray-coating a catalyst ink is unreported. Herein, we report the effects of acid washing through physicochemical and electrochemical characterisation. The electrochemical performance was determined through repeated measurements of catalyst-coated nickel foam substrates both with and without the initial step of acid washing. It was found that acid washing increased the current density by 17.9% for the acid-treated MoS 2 -coated nickel foam electrode. This increment was affiliated with an electrochemically active surface area that increased by 11.2%, and a Tafel analysis indicated that the acid-treated MoS 2 -coated electrodes facilitated the initial water dissociation step of the hydrogen evolution reaction with greater ease. Similar effects were also discovered for acid-treated PtIr(1:3)/C-coated nickel foam substrates. The stability was also improved; the degradation rate was reduced by 18.9% for the acid-treated MoS 2 -coated electrodes. This demonstrates the utility of acid washing nickel foam electrodes.

Keywords: acid washing; nickel foam; hydrogen evolution reaction; alkaline water electrolysis; electrode preparation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/16/5/2083/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/16/5/2083/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jeners:v:16:y:2023:i:5:p:2083-:d:1075098

Access Statistics for this article

Energies is currently edited by Ms. Agatha Cao

More articles in Energies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().