Novel electrocatalyst of nanoporous FeP cubes prepared by fast electrodeposition coupling with acid-etching for efficient hydrogen evolution

Abstract For the development and utilization of renewable energy, it is impending but still a big challenge to develop cost-effective and stable electrocatalysts with feasible synthetic strategies towards hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). Herein, we have proposed a facile and simple strategy for the preparation of non-precious nanoporous FeP cubes within 35 min by acid etching the electrodeposited Fe/FeOOH/FeP precursors at room temperature. The FeP cubes materials possessed unique nanoporous structures on the surface and inside, which were beneficial to expose more active sites and effectively accelerate the mass transfer. Therefore, the as-synthesized nanoporous FeP cubes exhibited favourable catalytic HER activity with low overpotential to approach 10 mA cm−2 in both acid and alkaline media, as well as long-term stability in acid solution. We expect that this facile synthetic strategy of nanoporous FeP cubes will provide a promising prospect for boosting the development of non-precious HER electrocatalysts.