Partially Pyrolyzed Binary Metal–Organic Framework Nanosheets for Efficient Electrochemical Hydrogen Peroxide Synthesis

Abstract

Herein, we developed a partially controlled pyrolysis strategy to create evenly distributed NiO nanoparticles within NiFe‐MOF nanosheets (MOF NSs) for electrochemical synthesis of H 2 O 2 by a two‐electron oxygen reduction reaction (ORR). The elemental Ni can be partially transformed to NiO and uniformly distributed on the surface of the MOF NSs, which is crucial for the formation of the particular structure. The optimized MOF NSs‐300 exhibits the highest activity for ORR with near‐zero overpotential and excellent H 2 O 2 selectivity (ca. 99 %) in 0.1 m KOH solution. A high‐yield H 2 O 2 production rate of 6.5 mol g cat−1 h−1 has also been achieved by MOF NSs‐300 in 0.1 m KOH and at 0.6 V (vs. RHE). In contrast to completely pyrolyzed products, the enhanced catalytic activities of partially pyrolyzed MOF NSs‐300 originates mainly from the retained MOF structure and the newly generated NiO nanoparticles, forming the coordinatively unsaturated Ni atoms and tuning the performance towards electrochemical H 2 O 2 synthesis.