Dual-site catalysts featuring platinum-group-metal atoms on copper shapes boost hydrocarbon formations in electrocatalytic CO 2 reduction

• Published in: Nature communications Vol. 14; no. 1; p. 3075
• Main Authors: Chhetri, Manjeet, Wan, Mingyu, Jin, Zehua, Yeager, John, Sandor, Case, Rapp, Conner, Wang, Hui, Lee, Sungsik, Bodenschatz, Cameron J, Zachman, Michael J, Che, Fanglin, Yang, Ming
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England 27-05-2023
• ISSN: 2041-1723

Copper-based catalyst is uniquely positioned to catalyze the hydrocarbon formations through electrochemical CO
reduction. The catalyst design freedom is limited for alloying copper with H-affinitive elements represented by platinum group metals because the latter would easily drive the hydrogen evolution reaction to override CO
reduction. We report an adept design of anchoring atomically dispersed platinum group metal species on both polycrystalline and shape-controlled Cu catalysts, which now promote targeted CO
reduction reaction while frustrating the undesired hydrogen evolution reaction. Notably, alloys with similar metal formulations but comprising small platinum or palladium clusters would fail this objective. With an appreciable amount of CO-Pd
moieties on copper surfaces, facile CO
hydrogenation to CHO
or CO-CHO
coupling is now viable as one of the main pathways on Cu(111) or Cu(100) to selectively produce CH
or C
H
through Pd-Cu dual-site pathways. The work broadens copper alloying choices for CO
reduction in aqueous phases.