Developing an oxygen evolution reaction electrocatalyst with low cost, abundant reserves and excellent performance is essential for the large scale application of renewable hydrogen energy. Herein, a selenium doped hierarchical Ni-based electrocatalyst was fabricated. Nickel nanosheet array (NNA) was firstly electrodeposited on stainless steel, and then selenium was doped in the NNA to form a hierarchical nanosheet structure via a hydrothermal process. The effect of hydrothermal temperature and duration on the OER performance were investigated. Results shown that after selenization at 140 °C for 12 h, the NNA electrodeposited for 30 min performed best OER performance with a current density of 50 mA cm−2 at overpotential of 365 mV and a small Tafel slope of about 34 mV dec−1. This work provides a valuable strategy to design high efficiency electrocatalysts and shows the universality of selenization for improving catalytic performance.
