A facile route for decoration of hematite photoanodes by transition metal hydroxide co‐catalysts

Abstract

Earth‐abundant α‐Fe2O3 (hematite) is a convincing photoanode for photoelectrochemical (PEC) water splitting; however, its intrinsic properties of inferior charge transfer and sluggish water oxidation kinetics limit its performance. Here, we report a straightforward decoration method for transition metal hydroxides to accelerate the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) of hematite photoanodes grown by electric field‐assisted liquid phase deposition (EA‐LPD). The investigations revealed that Co(OH)2 acts as a superior co‐catalyst compared with hydroxides of Mn, Fe, Co, Ni, and Zn. EA‐LPD‐grown hematite photoanode loaded with cobalt hydroxide exhibited an excellent PEC performance. A photocurrent density of 0.93 mA.cm−2 at 1.23 V versus reversible hydrogen electrode was achieved for the modified hematite, ∼3 times more than that of pristine hematite, and a cathodic shift of 100 mV for the onset potential was observed. The proposed simple and cost‐effective co‐catalyst loading strategy provides a high degree of freedom in the design of co‐catalysts with a complex chemical composition comprising transition metal oxyhydroxides and hydroxides on different photoanodes for more efficient charge carrier separation for the PEC applications.