Authors
Gemeda Jemal Usa, Caique C Oliveira, Varinder Pal, Suman Sarkar, Gebisa Bekele Feyisa, Moumita Kotal, Emmanuel Femi Olu, Pedro A S Autreto, Temesgen Debelo Desissa, Chandra Sekhar Tiwary
Published in
Physical chemistry chemical physics : PCCP. Aug 03, 2026. Epub Aug 03, 2026.
Abstract
With the increase in the complexity of materials used in various sophisticated electronic devices, recycling of e-waste is increasingly challenging. In the present study, we have converted thermoelectric (TE) waste into a functional hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) electrocatalyst by considering a circular-economy and low-carbon approach. The as-received TE waste was processed through ball milling (TE waste-BM) and melting-casting (TE waste-M) routes. Morphological and structural evaluations revealed that the formation of a BiSbTe3/ZnTe heterostructure in TE-waste-M promotes HE efficiency when compared to the presence of a Bi2Te3/BiSbTe3 heterostructure (TE-waste-BM). TE waste-M exhibited lower overpotential and a smaller Tafel slope than TE waste-BM and stable operation for 18 h with negligible current decay, attributed to the accelerated charge transfer, fast water dissociation steps and rapid hydrogen adsorption in TE waste-M, originating from the presence of a BiSbTe3/ZnTe heterostructure and defect-enriched interfaces. First-principles calculations based on density functional theory (DFT) revealed that the strengthened bonding states of the heterostructures near the Fermi level aid in enhancing the HER activity of the BiSbTe3/ZnTe heterostructure. This work simultaneously integrates waste management with green hydrogen production by offering an economically viable, scalable and low-carbon approach to HER catalysts.
PMID:
42544401
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 03 Aug 2026.
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