A Core-Shell-Structured Silver Nanowire/Nitrogen-Doped Carbon Catalyst for Enhanced and Multifunctional Electrofixation of CO2.

Abstract

Numerous catalysts have been successfully introduced for CO2 fixation in aqueous or organic systems. However, a single catalyst showing activity in both solvent types is still rare, to the best of our knowledge. We developed a core-shell-structured AgNW/NC700 composite using a Ag nanowire (NW) core encapsulated by a N-doped carbon (NC) shell at 700 °C. Through control experiments and density functional theory calculations, it was confirmed that Ag nanowires acted as the active sites for CO2 fixation and the uniformly coating of N-doped carbon created a CO2 -rich environment around the Ag nanowires, which could significantly improve the catalytic activity of Ag nanowires for electrochemical CO2 fixation. Under mild conditions, up to 96 % faradaic efficiency of CO, 95 % yield of Ibuprofen and 92 % yield of propylene carbonate could be obtained in the electrochemical CO2 direct reduction, carboxylation and cycloaddition, respectively, using the same AgNWs/NC700 catalyst. These results might provide an alternative strategy for efficient electrochemical fixation of CO2 .