Triboelectric Nanogenerator Drives Electrochemical Water Splitting for Hydrogen Production: Fundamentals, Progress, and Challenges

Abstract

Currently, triboelectric nanogenerators (TENGs) are drawing significant attention owing to their potential in harvesting wave and wind energy from environment as well as their capability for driving electrochemical water splitting for hydrogen fuel production. This review aims to summarize the recent progress of ocean wave and wind energy harvesting TENGs and TENG‐driven electrochemical water splitting processes for hydrogen evolution reaction. For better understanding, this review begins from the fundamentals of TENG and electrochemical water splitting. And then the working principle of TENGs and mechanism of electrochemical (EC) water splitting for hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) are introduced. Subsequently the progress of output performance enhancement in ocean wave and wind energy harvesting TENGs are systematically discussed including structure design, triboelectric material selection and power management all of which are important for output performance enhancement and the integration of TENGs with electrochemical water splitting cell. Although this review focus on the promotion strategies of TENG‐driven electrochemical water splitting processes for HER, challenges for water splitting are also highlighted. While envision that this review provides a deep insight and direction to the design of TENG‐driven electrochemical system for promoting the hydrogen fuel production in an active, economical manner.