Highly active oxygen evolution integrated with efficient CO <sub>2</sub> to CO electroreduction

Yongtao Meng, Xiao Zhang, Wei‐Hsuan Hung, Junkai He, Yi-Sheng Tsai, Yun Kuang, Michael J. Kenney, Jing‐Jong Shyue, Yijin Liu, Kevin H. Stone,

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 2019 · 80 citations · 32 references

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Abstract

Significance Electrochemical reduction of CO 2 to useful chemicals or fuels is critical to closing the carbon cycle and preventing further deterioration of the environment/climate. This work addresses the low-energy-efficiency problem of CO 2 reduction limited by sluggish oxygen evolution reaction (OER) on the anode side. The only active OER catalysts for coupling CO 2 reduction in neutral conditions are based on noble metals such as Ir, Ru, and gold. Herein, we developed a nonprecious-metal-based OER anode with higher activity and stability than those based on noble-metal catalysts IrO 2 and Ir/C. We integrated our anode with a selective CO 2 reduction cathode to achieve &gt;97% conversion of CO 2 to CO and a record-setting high energy efficiency for CO 2 conversion.

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