Periodically Ordered Nanoporous Perovskite Photoelectrode for Efficient Photoelectrochemical Water Splitting

Abstract

Nonmetallic materials with localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) have a great potential for solar energy harvesting applications. Exploring nonmetallic plasmonic materials is desirable yet challenging. Herein, an efficient nonmetallic plasmonic perovskite photoelectrode, namely, SrTiO3, with a periodically ordered nanoporous structure showing an intense LSPR in the visible light region is reported. The crystalline-core@amorphous-shell structure of the SrTiO3 photoelectrode enables a strong LSPR due to the high charge carrier density induced by oxygen vacancies in the amorphous shell. The reversible tunability in LSPR of the SrTiO3 photoelectrode was observed by oxidation/reduction treatment and incident angle adjusting. Such a nonmetallic plasmonic SrTiO3 photoelectrode displays a dramatic plasmon-enhanced photoelectrochemical water splitting performance with a photocurrent density of 170.0 μA cm–2 under visible light illumination and a maximum incident photon-to-current-conversion efficiency of 4.0% in the visible light region, which are comparable to the state-of-the-art plasmonic noble metal sensitized photoelectrodes.