(154a) Earth-Abundant Catalysts for HER— the Key Figures in the Green Energy Campaign

Progress in sustainable energy is driven by society's needs. 40 years ago, worldwide energy shortage used to be a top priority. However, due to the facts that the detection of the earth's conventional fossil fuels incorporating coal, oil and natural gas exceeded people's expectations, and renewable energy sources such as solar energy, wind energy, nuclear energy made great breakthroughs in aspects of technology, the development direction of energy system has been gradually changed from solving the energy crisis to building clean and sustainable energy systems. Among new energy systems, hydrogen energy is desirable because of the highest energy density per unit mass, and only water as the byproduct. Currently, more than 90 percent of the hydrogen is produced industrially by cracking fossil fuels which are low-cost but damage the environment greatly. Herein, one of the main development directions of people is the electrolysis of water to produce hydrogen. For example, utilization of solar energy, wind energy, and other renewable sources, the electrochemical water splitting technology has had vigorously promoted and contributed to 4 percent of hydrogen production worldwide(2018). In recent years, tremendous effort has been paid to design a cost-effective and high-efficiency electrocatalyst for Hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). The innovation of theory and methodology plays an important role in finding and preparing those catalysts. In addition to the original achievements in field of inorganic synthesis and preparative chemistry, the advances of creative theory are also very critical in consideration of high demand of clean energy.