Antimony selenosulfide, Sb2(S,Se)3, has emerged as a promising light-harvesting material for its high absorption coefficient, suitable bandgap, low-toxic and low-cost constituents. However, the poor stability and high cost of widely...
The design and development of materials at the nanoscale has enabled efficient, cutting‐edge renewable energy storage, and conversion devices such as solar cells, water splitting, fuel cells, batteries, and supercapacitors. In addition to creating new materials, the ability to refine the structure and interface properties holds the key to achieving superior performance and durability of these devices. Atomic layer deposition (ALD) has become an important tool for nanofabrication as it allows the deposition of pin‐hole‐free films with atomic‐level thickness and composition control over high aspect ratio surfaces. ALD is successfully used to fabricate devices for renewable energy storage and conversion, for example, to deposit absorber materials, passivation layers, selective contacts, catalyst films, protection barriers, etc. In this review article, recent advances enabled by ALD in designing materials for high‐performance solar cells, catalytic energy conversion systems, batteries, and fuel cells, are summarized. The critical issues impeding the performance and durability of these devices are introduced and then the role of ALD in addressing them is discussed. Finally, the challenges in the implementation of ALD technique for nanofabrication on industrial scale are highlighted and a perspective on potential solutions is provided.
This work reports on H2 fuel generation from sewage water using Cu/CuO nanoporous (NP) electrodes. This is a novel concept for converting contaminated water into H2 fuel. The preparation of Cu/CuO NP was achieved using a simple thermal combustion process of Cu metallic foil at 550 °C for 1 h. The Cu/CuO surface consists of island-like structures, with an inter-distance of 100 nm. Each island has a highly porous surface with a pore diameter of about 250 nm. X-ray diffraction (XRD) confirmed the formation of monoclinic Cu/CuO NP material with a crystallite size of 89 nm. The prepared Cu/CuO photoelectrode was applied for H2 generation from sewage water achieving an incident to photon conversion efficiency (IPCE) of 14.6%. Further, the effects of light intensity and wavelength on the photoelectrode performance were assessed. The current density (Jph) value increased from 2.17 to 4.7 mA·cm−2 upon raising the light power density from 50 to 100 mW·cm−2. Moreover, the enthalpy (ΔH*) and entropy (ΔS*) values of Cu/CuO electrode were determined as 9.519 KJ mol−1 and 180.4 JK−1·mol−1, respectively. The results obtained in the present study are very promising for solving the problem of energy in far regions by converting sewage water to H2 fuel.
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