Earth-Abundant Metal Oxides for Anodic Reactions in Acidic Electrolytes

The development of electrochemical systems such as electrolyzers and photoelectrochemical devices in corrosive electrolytes has been limited by the lack of earth-abundant materials that are both stable in acidic electrolytes and efficiently utilize energy for electrochemical reactions. Chapter 1 introduces several of the challenges in developing earth-abundant materials for electrochemical systems in acidic electrolytes, such as electrocatalysts for the oxygen and the chlorine evolution reactions, and protective layers for photoanodes. Chapter 2 reports the electrochemical behavior of crystalline transition metal antimonates consisting of solid solutions of MnSb2O6 with NiSb2O6 for the oxygen evolution reaction in strongly acidic electrolytes. In Chapter 3, the crystalline transition metal antimonates NiSb2O6, CoSb2O6, and MnSb2O6 are investigated for the chlorine evolution reaction, and CoSb2O6 is found to exhibit activity and stability comparable to noble metal oxide electrocatalysts. Chapter 4 describes the development of earth-abundant SnOx coatings as protective heterojunctions for planar Si photoanodes in corrosive electrolytes. Chapter 5 focuses on the development of conformal SnOx coatings that form protective heterojunctions on Si microcone photoanodes. The work presented herein demonstrates several strategies towards the development of stable earth-abundant materials for efficient electrochemical and photoelectrochemical energy conversion in acidic electrolytes.