(Invited) Precious Metal-Free Electrocatalysis: Accomplishments and Challenges

In this short presentation, we will concentrate on entirely precious metal-free electrocatalysts as potential alternatives to the incumbent platinum group metal (PGM) materials for electrochemical reactions occurring in acidic, relevant to the energy conversion and storage: (i) oxygen reduction reaction (ORR), (ii) hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) and, time permitted, (iii) hydrogen peroxide generation (“two-electron ORR”). In the first part of this presentation, we will offer a summary of the development of non-precious metal ORR catalysts, emphasizing in particular the approaches that aim at improving the ORR active-site density and understanding of the origins of electrocatalytic activity of non-precious metal catalysts in oxygen reduction as a prerequisite for further development of this class of catalysts. We will focus on metal-nitrogen-carbon (M-N-C) catalysts obtained via the high-temperature treatment of organic precursors of carbon and nitrogen and inorganic precursors of a transition metal, which have been under development at Los Alamos for over a decade and have consistently exhibited the highest ORR activity in both electrochemical-cell and fuel cell testing to date. The second part of this presentation will be devoted to less frequently studied electrocatalysts based on small organic molecules as materials for hydrogen evolution reaction and hydrogen peroxide generation in a two-electron ORR. Unlike the oxygen reduction reaction catalysts in the first part of the talk, these HER/two-electron ORR catalysts are entirely metal-free and have been obtained by a low-temperature synthesis route. In addition to exhibiting a promising activity in electrochemical testing these catalysts show good performance durability over several days of continuous operation. The density functional theory (DFT) calculations have been performed to gain an insight into the reaction mechanisms of HER and two-electron ORR on various conformations of one selected organic molecule. The calculations have revealed thermodynamically favorable reaction pathways and structure-activity relationships, which can guide future synthesis of this new class of electrocatalysts. Acknowledgements Financial support of this research by the U.S. Department of Energy via Fuel Cell Technologies Office (FCTO) and by Los Alamos National Laboratory via Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) program is gratefully acknowledged.