Atomic insights into the competitive edge of nanosheets splitting water

The oxygen evolution reaction (OER) provides the protons for many electrocatalytic power-to-X processes, such as the production of green hydrogen from water or methanol from CO2. Iridium oxo-hydroxides (IOHs) are outstanding catalysts for this reaction because they strike a unique balance between activity and stability in acidic electrolytes. Within IOHs, this balance varies with atomic structure. While amorphous IOHs perform best, they are least stable. The opposite is true for their crystalline counterparts. These rules-of-thumb are used to reduce the loading of scarce IOH catalysts and retain performance. However, it is not fully understood how activity and stability are related on the atomic level, hampering rational design. Herein, we provide simple design-rules (Figure 12) derived from literature and various IOHs within this study. We chose crystalline IrOOH nanosheets as our lead material because they provide excellent catalyst utilization and a predictable structure. We found that nanosheets combine the chemical stability of crystalline IOHs with the activity amorphous IOHs. Their dense bonding network of pyramidal trivalent oxygens (μ3∆–O) provides structural integrity, while allowing reversible reduction to an electronically gapped state that diminishes the destructive effect of reductive potentials. The reactivity originates from coordinative unsaturated edge sites with radical character, i.e. μ1–O oxyls. By comparing to other IOHs and literature, we generalized our findings and synthesized a set of simple rules that allow prediction of stability and reactivity of IOHs from atomistic models. We hope that these rules will inspire atomic design strategies for future OER catalysts.