Premium
Metal‐Doped Nitrogenated Carbon as an Efficient Catalyst for Direct CO 2 Electroreduction to CO and Hydrocarbons
Author(s) -
Varela Ana Sofia,
Ranjbar Sahraie Nastaran,
Steinberg Julian,
Ju Wen,
Oh HyungSuk,
Strasser Peter
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
angewandte chemie international edition
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 5.831
H-Index - 550
eISSN - 1521-3773
pISSN - 1433-7851
DOI - 10.1002/anie.201502099
Subject(s) - catalysis , carbon fibers , pyrolysis , inorganic chemistry , metal , syngas , electrocatalyst , hydrogen , materials science , chemistry , electrochemistry , organic chemistry , electrode , composite number , composite material
This study explores the kinetics, mechanism, and active sites of the CO 2 electroreduction reaction (CO2RR) to syngas and hydrocarbons on a class of functionalized solid carbon‐based catalysts. Commercial carbon blacks were functionalized with nitrogen and Fe and/or Mn ions using pyrolysis and acid leaching. The resulting solid powder catalysts were found to be active and highly CO selective electrocatalysts in the electroreduction of CO 2 to CO/H 2 mixtures outperforming a low‐area polycrystalline gold benchmark. Unspecific with respect to the nature of the metal, CO production is believed to occur on nitrogen functionalities in competition with hydrogen evolution. Evidence is provided that sufficiently strong interaction between CO and the metal enables the protonation of CO and the formation of hydrocarbons. Our results highlight a promising new class of low‐cost, abundant electrocatalysts for synthetic fuel production from CO 2 .