Electrochemical promotion of nanodispersed Ru-Co catalysts for the hydrogenation of CO2

Abstract

Electrochemical promotion of the CO2 hydrogenation to CH4 and CO on a nanodispersed Ru-Co catalyst has been achieved via slurry deposition of the nanodispersed catalyst on an interlayer Ru film deposited on a BZY (BaZr0.85Y0.15O3) proton conducting solid electrolyte disc. The effect of current is nonFaradaic, with Faradaic efficiency values as high as 60 and leads to a reversible variation of the selectivity to CH4 between 16% and 41%. Due to thermal spillover of protons on the Ru-Co catalyst surface, the open circuit selectivity to CO is quite high, i.e. up to 84% and similar values are obtained via negative potential application, i.e. proton supply to the Ru catalyst film deposited on BZY before the deposition of the nanodispersed catalyst. These results underline the similarity between electrochemical promotion and metal support interactions when using proton conducting supports. They also show the usefulness of electrochemical promotion for mechanistic investigations. The electrochemical promotion of nanodispersed catalysts is a promising step for the practical utilization of electrochemical promotion.