(Invited) Overcoming Challenges in Transitioning Electroreduction of CO2 to a Deployable Technology

Abstract

Since 2010, the electrochemical reduction of CO2 has evolved from a barely studied topic to one of the most active research areas in the field of electrochemistry. The need to reduce global CO2 emissions has driven the vigorous pursuit of different electrocatalysts, electrodes, and electrolyzer configurations that are able to reduce CO2 to different value added intermediates or products ever more selectively and efficiently. With many catalysts now available, attention has started to shift to topics such as catalyst stability, electrode durability, and electrolysis operation optimization. These efforts increasingly are tied to ever more-detailed techno-comic and life cycle analyses.This presentation will provide an overview where some of these ‘beyond CO2RR catalyst discovery’ efforts are. What about durability of electrodes in different cell configurations? What should larger electrolyzer stack designs looks like, and how should they be operated to maximize performance (rate and/or selectivity)? How to optimize performance in light of dilute CO2 feeds from industrial point sources or from direct air capture, with these feeds containing different contaminants and/or oxygen? A separate idea is to pursue a co-conversion approach where conversion of an industrial waste stream or conversion of a renewable feed (e.g., from biomass) into a valued-added chemical on the anode is performed in parallel with electroreduction of CO2 on the cathode. This presentation will explore some of these aforementioned challenges based on our work as well as the work by others.