Bifunctional Electrolyzation for Simultaneous Organic Pollutant Degradation and Hydrogen Generation

Abstract

Smart combining of electrooxidation of organic pollutant and electrocatalytic hydrogen evolution in a single reaction system is a promising solution for simultaneous wastewater treatment and renewable energy generation. Herein, we report a bifunctional electrolyzer with NiMoO4 and its reduced derivative as the anode and the cathode for the phenol oxidation reaction (POR) and the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), respectively. The anode shows high efficiency in phenol degradation, in which the direct oxidation by •OH on the anode surface is responsible for the POR. The cathode exhibits prominent HER performance with 67 mV overpotential at 10 mA/cm2 and strong resistance to the poison effect from phenol degradation intermediates. It is demonstrated that the NiMoO4-based catalysts can be readily used as highly efficient and robust electrodes for simultaneous phenol degradation and H2 generation. Such a bifunctional electrolyzation system opens a new avenue of advanced technologies for wastewater treatment and renewable energy production.