Bismuthene for highly efficient carbon dioxide electroreduction reaction

Fa Yang,Manos Mavrikakis,Jiawei Wang,Shuyan Song,Zhangquan Peng,Weilin Xu,Ahmed O Elnabawy,Shuang Yao,Yue Lin,Ruiping Deng,Ping Song,Roberto Schimmenti

doi:10.1038/s41467-020-14914-9

Abstract

Bismuth (Bi) has been known as a highly efficient electrocatalyst for CO2 reduction reaction. Stable free-standing two-dimensional Bi monolayer (Bismuthene) structures have been predicted theoretically, but never realized experimentally. Here, we show the first simple large-scale synthesis of free-standing Bismuthene, to our knowledge, and demonstrate its high electrocatalytic efficiency for formate (HCOO−) formation from CO2 reduction reaction. The catalytic performance is evident by the high Faradaic efficiency (99% at −580 mV vs. Reversible Hydrogen Electrode (RHE)), small onset overpotential (<90 mV) and high durability (no performance decay after 75 h and annealing at 400 °C). Density functional theory calculations show the structure-sensitivity of the CO2 reduction reaction over Bismuthene and thicker nanosheets, suggesting that selective formation of HCOO− indeed can proceed easily on Bismuthene (111) facet due to the unique compressive strain. This work paves the way for the extensive experimental investigation of Bismuthene in many different fields.

Highlights

Bismuth (Bi) has been known as a highly efficient electrocatalyst for CO2 reduction reaction
Density functional theory (DFT) calculations suggest that this high catalytic performance can be attributed to the large compressive strain found in free-standing Bismuthene
Based on a simple reduction reaction with Bismuth (III) chloride (BiCl3) as the Bi precursor and NaBH4 as the reductant, a series of free-standing 2D bismuth nanosheets (BiNSs) with different thicknesses were synthesized (Supplementary Figs. 1, 2)

Summary

Introduction

Bismuth (Bi) has been known as a highly efficient electrocatalyst for CO2 reduction reaction. Over the past three decades, researchers have evaluated a variety of bulk metals (such as Pb, Hg, In, Cd, Sn, Co) as electrodes for CO2RR to produce formate in aqueous solutions[7,8] These electrodes usually suffer from high cost, large overpotential, limited availability, poor selectivity as well as poor durability, which seriously hinder their large-scale practical applications[9,10]. To address these issues, several electrocatalytic systems based on naturally abundant and chemically stable metal elements have been recently explored as potential CO2 electroreduction catalysts[2,11,12]. Density functional theory (DFT) calculations suggest that this high catalytic performance can be attributed to the large compressive strain found in free-standing Bismuthene

Methods

Results

Conclusion