Aspect Ratio‐Engineered Ru‐Integrated W 18 O 49 : Controlled Growth and Enhanced Electrocatalytic Activity

The sustainable production of renewable fuels and feedstocks is currently constrained by the slow kinetics of anodic oxygen evolution reaction (OER). Precious metal-based catalysts such as Ir suffer from stability issues as well as high capital cost. To enforce the future of green hydrogen production, this study develops Ru-integrated W18O49 nanowires (NWs), as an efficient and stable OER electrocatalyst. This study obtains Ru-W18O49 NWs by a combined physical vapor deposition–chemical vapor deposition approach. It discovers the NWs growth mechanism, characterized by two different growth kinetics. Herein, it finds that the integration of just 3% of Ru in the oxygen-deficient W18O49 NWs remarkably increases the number of active catalytic sites during OER, showing faster kinetics (60 mV dec−1) and a reduced overpotential of 360 mV at 10 mA cm−2. The electrode's observed catalytic performance and long-term durability over 36 h (12 h each at 10, 30, and 100 mA cm−2) combined with the versatility of the two-step synthetic route, are a promising research approach for future industrial applications.