Red phosphorus as self-template to hierarchical nanoporous nickel phosphides toward enhanced electrocatalytic activity for oxygen evolution reaction

A simple and effective red phosphorus self-templated wet-chemical method was proposed to fabricate hierarchical nanoporous metal phosphides, whose pore sizes and porosities can be easily modulated by changing the addition of ionic liquids (ILs). The resultant products possess large specific surface areas (206.8 m2 g−1) and big pore volume (0.7145 cm3 g−1 nm−1), which endowed the as-synthesized nickel phosphides with outstanding electrocatalytic activities for OER in terms of Tafel slopes (46 mv dec−1), the operating potential at the benchmark current density of 10 mA cm−2 (246 mV) and long term electrocatalytic stability. These interesting results will promote the use of ILs as controlling agent for the preparation of porous catalysts in the electrocatalytic OER and the development of synthesis of porous nanomaterials.