Fe-Co bimetallic MOF-derived carbon directly application as an efficient electrocatalyst for oxygen evolution reaction

Hydrogen energy has attracted widespread attention as a high-energy–density, sustainable and clean energy source. Hydrogen production by electrolysis of water is a simple and efficient method of hydrogen production. However, most of the currently widely used commercial catalysts are expensive precious metals and their oxides. Therefore, it is necessary to develop low-cost, efficient and stable catalysts to promote the development of the hydrogen energy industry. Metal organic framework (MOF), as a new type of porous, high surface area material, has great potential in catalysis. Bimetallic MOF materials can further improve the catalytic activity of MOF materials as electrocatalysts by adjusting metal sites. In this paper, different proportions of Fe-Co bimetallic MOF materials were synthesized by hydrothermal method, and the Fe-Co bimetallic carbon materials prepared by carbonization at high temperature were used as OER electrocatalyst, and the microstructure and electrochemical performance of the materials were analyzed and evaluated through microscopic mechanism characterization and electrochemical characterization. The test results show that Fe-Co bimetallic carbon materials have excellent electrocatalytic performance, Fe 2 Co/C and RuO 2 have the smallest high-frequency semicircles, and have the smallest internal charge transfer resistance. This indicates that Fe 2 Co/C has similar conductivity to RuO 2 . When the current density is 10 mA·cm −2 , Fe 2 Co/C has an overpotential of 335 mV, and when the current density is 50 mA·cm −2 , Fe 2 Co/C has an overpotential of 382 mV, and the oxygen evolution performance of Fe 2 Co/C is better than that of commercial precious metal catalyst RuO 2 at high current density. At the same time, its Tafel slope is only 58.8 mV·dec −1 , which is lower than that of RuO 2 catalyst, and it has a faster charge transfer rate. After CV cycles and 12 h of electrolysis by continuous chronoamperometry electrolysis, it exhibited excellent electrocatalytic stability.