Electrochemical CO2 reduction on heterogeneous cobalt phthalocyanine catalysts with different carbon supports

Abstract

Supporting materials have a significant impact on heterogeneous molecular catalysts. Herein, we have studied the electrochemical CO2 reduction on cobalt phthalocyanine (CoPc) with Vulcan XC-72 and carbon nanotubes (CNTs) supports, respectively. Compared with pure CoPc, the resulting CoPc/XC-72 and CoPc/CNTs exhibits a notable improvement in catalytic activity. The CoPc/XC-72 maintains a stable polarization just for 15 h with a turnover number (TON) of 48,600, whereas the CoPc/CNTs lasts over 45 h with a high TON of 180,000 and CO Faraday efficiency of 88%. The excellent catalytic stability of CoPc/CNTs is attributed to a strong π-π interaction between CoPc and CNTs.