(Digital Presentation) Synergistic Effect of Sn and Cu Oxides for the Electrochemical Reduction of CO2 to Formic Acid

Abstract

The development of an electrochemical catalyst system that converts carbon dioxide (CO2) to high-value chemicals, such as formic acid (FA) will simultaneously curb CO2 emissions to atmosphere and provide sustainable pathways to create a range of fuels at lower cost. Electrochemical conversion of CO2 to FA is a two-electron reduction process and can be carried out at ambient conditions, and the reduced product has been found wide-ranging applications in chemical industries for production of household products, and a safe liquid-phase chemical for hydrogen storage. Synergistic bimetallic electrocatalysts can improve the activity and selectivity over their monometallic counterparts by tuning the structure, morphology, and composition. At the University of Kentucky’s Institute for Decarbonization and Energy Advancement (UK IDEA), our enhanced bimetallic oxide carbon utilization (EBOCU) process uses an engineered catalyst that facilitates operating at relatively low applied potentials, and high product selectivity to produce FA. Using bimetallic tin-copper oxide containing 95 mol% of Sn and 5 mol% of Cu immobilized on mesoporous carbon xerogel and alkaline electrolyte, we observed that hydrogen evolution reaction is suppressed and the selectivity towards formate is enhanced for the cell potential from 3.6 V through 4.0 V. Notably, our electrochemical reactor is successful in converting CO2 to formate at the rate of 2 mM/h in 3 mL/min flow system. Maximum faradaic efficiency of 94% is achieved towards formate at 3.8 V, which remained above 80% even after 200 h of continuous operation.