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Updated: Aug 14, 2025
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Synthesis and Performance Characterizations of Transition Metal Single Atom Catalyst for Electrochemical CO2 Reduction
Published on: April 10, 2018
18.3K
Controllable CO adsorption determines ethylene and methane productions from CO2 electroreduction
Haipeng Bai1, Tao Cheng2, Shangyu Li1
1State Key Laboratory of Molecular Engineering of Polymers, Department of Macromolecular Science and Laboratory of Advanced Materials, Fudan University, Shanghai 200438, China.
Science Bulletin
|January 19, 2023
Summary
Researchers developed two copper nanocatalysts for CO2 electroreduction. These catalysts precisely control carbon monoxide (CO) adsorption, achieving high selectivity for either methane (CH4) or ethylene (C2H4) production.
Area of Science:
- Electrochemistry
- Catalysis
- Materials Science
Background:
- CO2 electroreduction is crucial for sustainable chemical production.
- Controlling carbon monoxide (CO) adsorption on catalysts is key to selectively producing valuable hydrocarbons like methane (CH4) and ethylene (C2H4).
- Existing methods face challenges in experimentally controlling CO adsorption configurations, limiting hydrocarbon selectivity.
Purpose of the Study:
- To synthesize well-defined copper nanocatalysts with controllable surface structures.
- To achieve high and selective production of CH4 and C2H4 from CO2 electroreduction.
- To elucidate the relationship between CO adsorption configurations and hydrocarbon product selectivity.
Main Methods:
- Synthesis of two distinct copper nanocatalyst models.
- Characterization using scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) and X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS).
- Analysis of CO adsorption and reaction pathways using CO-temperature programmed desorption (CO-TPD), in-situ attenuated total reflection Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (in-situ ATR-FTIR), and density functional theory (DFT) calculations.
Main Results:
- One catalyst achieved 83% selectivity for CH4, while the other reached 93% selectivity for C2H4 under identical conditions.
- Characterization identified low-coordination Cu0 sites and local Cu0/Cu+ sites on the respective catalysts.
- DFT and spectroscopic studies revealed that bridge-adsorbed CO (COB) on Cu0 sites favors CH4, while COB + linear-adsorbed CO (COL) on Cu0/Cu+ sites favors C2H4.
Conclusions:
- Controllable surface structures on copper nanocatalysts enable precise control over CO adsorption configurations.
- Specific CO adsorption configurations (COB vs. COB + COL) dictate the reaction pathway towards CH4 or C2H4.
- This work provides a new strategy for designing catalysts with enhanced hydrocarbon selectivity in CO2 electroreduction.
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