Corrosion-Guided Surface Engineering of Permalloy for Efficient Alkaline Oxygen Evolution Reaction

Area of Science:

• Electrochemistry
• Materials Science
• Energy Conversion

Background:

• Water electrolysis for hydrogen production is hindered by the slow oxygen evolution reaction (OER).
• Non-noble metal catalysts are effective for alkaline OER.
• Developing efficient and cost-effective OER catalysts is crucial.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop an advanced oxygen evolution reaction (OER) electrocatalyst.
• To utilize an unconventional electrochemical anodization method for catalyst development.
• To enhance hydrogen production efficiency in water electrolysis.

Main Methods:

• Unconventional electrochemical anodization in acid (pH 0) of permalloy (Ni0.8Fe0.2).
• Characterization of the activated permalloy for OER performance in alkaline media (1.0 M KOH).
• Analysis of surface morphology and kinetics.

Main Results:

• The activated permalloy demonstrated high OER activity (10 mA cm-2 at 264 mV) with excellent stability (95% retention after 12 h).
• The catalyst exhibited ultrafast OER kinetics, indicated by a low Tafel slope (38 mV dec-1).
• Acid activation increased surface roughness and formed active NiFeOOH nanostructures.

Conclusions:

• Unconventional acid activation transforms inexpensive permalloy into a high-performance OER electrocatalyst.
• This method offers a cost-effective approach to enhance hydrogen production via water electrolysis.
• The electrochemical activation strategy can be applied to other substrates for various electrocatalytic reactions.