Hydrogen is a versatile commodity and will be a key player in reaching a 100% renewable energy future. Photoelectrochemical water splitting produces hydrogen without the emission of greenhouse gasses. This route has best been enabled on heterogenous III-V semiconductors because of their high electron mobility, and band gap tunability. These advantages enable high performances in tandem III-Vs for water reduction into H2 and oxidation into O2 at the photocathode and metal anode, respectively. However, the typical manufacturing costs of III-Vs stunt their entry to commercial markets. Here, we show the photoelectrochemical performances of an inverted GaInP2/GaAs crystal grown by the potentially low cost, high throughput technique of hydride vapor phase epitaxy (HVPE). This talk will emphasize the potential benefits of hydride vapor phase epitaxy and the science behind the spontaneous water splitting reaction on a III-V. Our results showcase a solar to hydrogen efficiency of 10.0% and over 5 hours of stability from a sample set grown by hydride vapor phase epitaxy. Hydride vapor phase epitaxy is a path to cost reduction for III-V manufacturing and could be the preferred semiconductor growth technique for researchers in III-V water splitting.

Spontaneous water splitting capability on III-Vs grown by hydride vapor phase epitaxy

ACS Spring 2022

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.