Active site engineering of intermetallic nanoparticles by the vapour–solid synthesis: carbon black supported nickel tellurides for hydrogen evolution

Abstract

The development and design of catalysts have become a major pillar of latest research efforts to make sustainable forms of energy generation accessible. The production of green hydrogen by electrocatalytic water splitting is dealt as one of the most promising ways to enable decarbonization. To make the hydrogen evolution reaction through electrocatalytic water splitting usable on a large scale, the development of highly-active catalysts with long-term stability and simple producibility is required. Recently, nickel tellurides were found to be an interesting alternative to noble-metal materials. Previous publications dealt with individual nickel telluride species of certain compositions due to the lack of broadly applicable synthesis strategies. For the first time, in this work the preparation of carbon black supported nickel telluride nanoparticles and their catalytic performance for the electrocatalytic hydrogen evolution reaction in alkaline media is presented. The facile vapour–solid synthesis strategy enabled remarkable control over the crystal structure and composition, demonstrating interesting opportunities of active site engineering. Both single- and multi-phase samples containing the Ni–Te compounds Ni₃Te₂, NiTe, NiTe_2−x & NiTe₂ were prepared. Onset potentials and overpotentials of −0.145 V vs. RHE and 315 mV at 10 mA cm⁻² respectively were achieved. Furthermore, it was found that the mass activity was dependent on the structure and composition of the nickel tellurides following the particular order: Ni₃Te₂ > NiTe > NiTe_2−x > NiTe₂.