A High-Performance Continuous Flow MEA Reactor for Electroreduction CO2 to Formate

Abstract

The electrochemical reduction of carbon dioxide reduction reaction (CO2RR) to liquid fuels and industrial chemicals represents a promising approach to the environmental remediation of carbon emissions and utilizing intermittent renewable electricity. However, the traditional device of electrolysis CO2 is seriously limited by low CO2 solubility, large PH gradient and high ohmic resistance due to the large distance between two electrodes, which is not applicable to industrial production. Herein, we demonstrate a high-performance continuous flow membranes electrode assembly (MEA) reactor based a self-growing Cu-Sn bimetallic electrocatalysts in the liquid-phase to electroreduction of CO2 to formate. We then via testing different electrolyzer structure explore the best performance of the flow MEA reactor, and compare with H-type cell. Notably, the reactor is designed not only greatly increase current density (66.41 mA cm-2) at -1.11 VRHE, but also maintain high Faraday efficiency (89.56%), and that can effective separation of the gaseous/liquid production. And then, we achieve the production rate of 1 L CO2 to formate (163 μmol h -1 cm-2) at working electrode at -0.97 VRHE and cell voltage at 3.17 V after 20 hours electrolysis. This present study provides a novel reactor can maximize the use of catalyst activity for electrochemical CO2RR and other emerging electrochemical catalysis research.