Highly active and durable catalyst for hydrogen generation from NaBH4 hydrolysis reaction: CoWB/NF nanodendrite with acicular array structure

Sodium borohydride (NaBH4) hydrolysis is a promising technology to produce high purity
hydrogen (H2) on-site for fuel cells. However, the wide applications of this technology are
hampered by the low catalytic activity and poor stability of catalyst for hydrogen production. To develop low-cost catalyst with high activity and good stability, a novel CoWB catalyst supported by nickel foam was prepared by pulse electrodeposition method for H2 production from NaBH4 alkaline solution. The SEM results revealed in the special microstructure of nanodendrite with acicular array, CoWB is uniformly plated on the surface of Ni foam (NF) substrate and is firmly adhered to the surface. The tungsten doping decreased the activation energy to as low as 18.15kJ·mol-1. The CoWB/NF catalyst exhibited higher hydrogen producing performance and the hydrogen generation rate (HGR) reached 14.13 L·min-1·g-1 cat, which was comparable to that of noble metal catalyst. More importantly, the catalyst demonstrated very good stability as the catalytic activity was maintained at 82% of its initial activity after 800 hours of usage. The CoWB/NF catalyst of hydrogen generator contributed to a generation of hydrogen with 99.9871%of purity at a HGR of 1.07 L/min. This study demonstrated that the novel CoWB/NF catalyst is very promising for hydrogen production from NaBH4 hydrolysis reaction.