Sustainable Hydrogen Production from Water Splitting on a Co3O4@LaCoO3Core-Shell Redox Catalyst

Abstract

This work investigates a core–shell structured Co3O4@LaCoO3 redox catalyst for the production of hydrogen via chemical looping water splitting. Though having low oxygen carrying capacities, LaCoO3 facilitates H2O splitting by lowering the kinetic barrier and overall exothermicity compared to Co3O4, and covering the Co3O4 nanoparticle surface with LaCoO3 thereby overcomes the poor H2 production activity of Co3O4. Since thermally stable LaCoO3 can suppress the sintering, applying the core–shell structure suppresses the aggregation of Co3O4 nanoparticles under cyclic redox. Thus, the core–shell structure redox catalyst can lead to both improved and sustainable H2 productivity compared with that obtained using only Co3O4 or LaCoO3.