2022 Annual Meeting
Transition Metal Doped Oxygenated Titanium Carbide As an Oer Catalyst
The push to decarbonize our infrastructure and economy has centered on the advance of renewable energy technologies. With this shift comes a need for efficient and reliable energy harvesting and energy storage. Hydrogen is a promising fuel as intermittent sources of renewable energy such as solar and wind power can be stored in its bonds through water electrolysis. The anodic oxygen evolution reaction (OER) is the limiting reaction for water splitting and defines the efficiency and cost of commercial water electrolyzers. Expensive platinum group metal (PGM) based catalysts are the current industry standard. However, widespread commercial integration of water electrolyzers necessitates the development of inexpensive and durable non-PGM catalyst materials. Here we present a novel oxygenated titanium carbide two-dimensional nanomaterial as a platform for non-PGM OER electrocatalysts. Post-synthesis transition metal doping (nickel and iron) is found to yield a competitive balance between activity and stability with OER overpotentials comparable to relevant PGM materials such as iridium oxide. The result is an inexpensive, scalable production of a potential non-PGM replacement for anodic OER electrocatalysts in water electrolyzers.