Removing the barrier to water dissociation on single-atom Pt sites decorated with a CoP mesoporous nanosheet array to achieve improved hydrogen evolution

Abstract

The hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) in alkaline solution has attracted considerable interest, but it is limited by the kinetically sluggish water dissociation step. Herein, we report single-atom Pt immobilized in the lattice of CoP mesoporous nanosheets (MNSs) grown on carbon fiber cloth (CFC) (Pt_at–CoP MNSs/CFC) with ultralow Pt loading (0.7 wt% relative to CoP, 5.89 μg cm_geo⁻²) as a high-performance electrocatalyst for the HER in alkaline solution. Assisted by the strong interaction between Pt_at and CoP, water dissociation becomes spontaneous, providing Pt_at–CoP MNSs/CFC with a low HER kinetic barrier. Accordingly, Pt_at–CoP MNSs/CFC exhibits outstanding HER performance with negligible onset potential, super high catalytic activity, and excellent durability that is even superior to the commercial 20 wt% Pt/C catalyst. Moreover, Pt_at–CoP MNSs/CFC exhibits excellent catalytic activity and stability toward seawater electrolysis.