A cauliflower-like Ni metal-organic phosphate modified carbon paste electrode as an efficient catalyst for electrochemical water oxidation in neutral media

[Display omitted] •The cauliflower-like Ni metal-organic phosphates (Ni-MOPh) was fabricated.•This was the first time that Ni-MOPh as a catalyst for water oxidation (pH = 7.1).•The synthesis time may influence the morphology and the ability of Ni-MOPh. We fabricated the cauliflower-like Ni metal-organic phosphates (Ni-MOPh) with different synthesis time (Ni-MOPh-Ts, Ts = Times) as an carbon paste electrode material (Ni-MOPh-Ts/C) for oxygen evolution reaction (OER) in neutral media. The as-synthesized Ni-MOPh-12 h/C shows a better OER ability than that of Ni-MOPh-6 h/C and Ni-MOPh-2 h/C, which also shows conspicuous performance with the overpotential of 420 mV to obtain 10 mA cm−2. Reaction kinetics studies exhibit that Ni-MOPh-12 h/C can provide higher electrochemical ability, mainly due to the small charge transfer resistance, and a high number of catalytic active sites.