CoP@NC electrocatalyst promotes hydrogen and oxygen productions for overall water splitting in alkaline media

Abstract Design and synthesis of high-performance bi-functional electrocatalysts can play a crucial role for electrolytic water splitting. Herein, we develop a simple phosphating process to construct cobalt phosphide@nitrogen-doped carbon (CoP@NC) using metal organic frame (MOF) as a precursor and a template. In alkaline solution, CoP@NC-350 exhibits exceptional hydrogen and oxygen evolution reaction performances with over potentials of 75 mV and 268 mV at 10 mA cm−2, respectively. For a symmetric CoP@NC-350 two-electrode water splitting setup, the potential can be low as 1.69 V to obtain 10 mA cm−2. Therefore, low-temperature phosphating treatment can be a simple and promising method to produce electrocatalysts for water splitting.