Fe/N-doped mesoporous carbons derived from soybeans: A highly efficient and low-cost non-precious metal catalyst for ORR

Oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) plays a crucial role in many energy storage and conversion devices. Currently, the development of inexpensive and high-performance carbon-based non-precious-metal ORR catalysts in alkaline media still gains a wide attention. In this paper, the mesoporous Fe-N/C catalysts were synthesized through SiO2-mediated templating method using biomass soybeans as the nitrogen and carbon sources. The SiO2 templates create a simultaneous optimization of both the surface functionalities and porous structures of Fe-N/C catalysts. Detailed investigations indicate that the Fe-N/C3 catalyst prepared with the mass ratio of SiO2 to soybean being 3:4 exhibits brilliant electrocatalytic performance, excellent long-term stability and methanol tolerance for the ORR, with the onset potential and the half-wave potential of the ORR being about 0.890 V and 0.783 V (vs RHE), respectively. Meanwhile, the desired 4-electron transfer pathway of the ORR on the catalysts can be observed. It is significantly proposed that the high BET specific surface area and the appropriate pore-size, as well as the high pyridinic-N and total nitrogen loadings may play key roles in enhancing the ORR performance for the Fe-N/C3 catalyst. These results suggest a feasible route based on the economical and sustainable soybean biomass to develop inexpensive and highly efficient non-precious metal electrochemical catalysts for the ORR.