Copper Nanoclusters Imparted Metalloporphyrin Based Metal-Organic Frameworks for Enhanced CO₂ Electroreduction

Strategies that can introduce catalytic auxiliary into electrocatalysts to boost the performance of electrocatalytic CO₂ reduction reaction (CO₂RR) are meaningful in exploring hybrid electrocatalytic systems. Here, a series of hybrid electrocatalysts (Cu NCs@MOF-545-M, M=Fe, Co and Ni) have been prepared by assembly Cu NCs with MOF-545-M (M=Fe, Co and Ni) and successfully applied in electrocatalytic CO₂RR. In the obtained MOF-545-M (M=Fe, Co and Ni), the integration of Cu NCs with MOF-545-M (M=Fe, Co and Ni) can create a hybrid electrocatalytic system that enhances the charge transfer efficiency and electrocatalytic CO₂RR activity. Specifically, the optimal Cu NCs@MOF-545-Co presents remarkable FE_CO over a wide potential range (-0.7 V to -1.0 V), high CO generation rate (8.2 mol m^-2 h^-1) and excellent maximum energy efficiency (69 %, -0.7 V), which is superior to Cu NCs and MOF-545-Co, and represented to be one of the best performances to date. This work demonstrates a facile approach to significantly improve the FE_CO by loading metal nanoclusters into MOFs, providing a valuable reference for future studies on hybridization strategies to enhance the performance of electrocatalysts.