Abstract

Clean hydrogen made from water-splitting through the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) is important for sustainability and reducing pollution. Exploration of high-efficiency Pt-free electrochemical catalysts for HER is considered a great challenge for the development of sustainable and carbon dioxide-free energy conversion systems. For that, electrocatalytic electrodes made of self-standing binder-free materials have been extensively employed in hydrogen production. Herein, the gelatin and graphene oxide cryogels were cryogeleted and then carbonized to create a unique interconnecting macroporous conducting carbon membrane. The conducting membrane is employed as a substrate for growing MoSe<inf>2</inf> nanosheets vertically using a simple solvothermal process. The electrochemical performance of the self-standing MoSe<inf>2</inf>-based heterogeneous binder-free materials was successively evaluated for HER. The excellent electrochemical hydrogen generation exhibited a low onset potential of −0.15 V vs the reversible hydrogen electrode and a Tafel slope of 51 mV/decade. In addition, remarkable stability with no current decay for over 20,000 s of testing was observed. The perpendicularly oriented nanostructure of the electrocatalyst on a highly carbon-porous electrode favored more exposed active sites. Such, an open 3D structure leads to an easily diffused electrolyte in which the exposed active edges of MoSe<inf>2</inf> nanostructures are a key issue to fully realizing the excellent electrochemical properties.