Numerical Modeling of CO 2 Reduction Reactions in a Batch Cell with Different Working Electrodes

Ahmad Ijaz (), SeyedSepehr Mostafayi, Mohammadreza Esmaeilirad, Mohammad Asadi, Javad Abbasian and Hamid Arastoopour ()
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Ahmad Ijaz: Wanger Institute for Sustainable Energy Research (WISER), Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, IL 60616, USA
SeyedSepehr Mostafayi: Wanger Institute for Sustainable Energy Research (WISER), Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, IL 60616, USA
Mohammadreza Esmaeilirad: Mojave Energy Systems, Sunnyvale, CA 94085, USA
Mohammad Asadi: Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, IL 60616, USA
Javad Abbasian: Wanger Institute for Sustainable Energy Research (WISER), Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, IL 60616, USA
Hamid Arastoopour: Wanger Institute for Sustainable Energy Research (WISER), Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, IL 60616, USA

Sustainability, 2025, vol. 17, issue 3, 1-25

Abstract: Batch cells are pivotal in advancing the foundational research of CO 2 reduction by providing precise control over reaction conditions to study catalyst behavior and reaction mechanisms, generating insights that drive the development of scalable systems like flow reactors and ultimately supporting sustainability through the industrial adoption of carbon-neutral technologies. Therefore, a one-dimensional numerical model is developed to study electrochemical CO 2 reduction reactions in a batch cell with three different working electrode configurations: solid electrode, glassy carbon electrode, and gas-diffusion-layer electrode. The experimental results of two Cu-based catalysts are used to obtain electrochemical kinetic parameters and to validate the numerical model. The simulation results demonstrate that both gas-diffusion-layer electrodes and glassy carbon electrodes with porous catalyst layers have superior performance over solid electrodes in terms of total current density. Furthermore, we studied the impact of the key parameters of batch cells with glassy carbon electrodes, such as boundary-layer thickness, catalyst-layer thickness, catalyst-layer porosity, electrolyte nature, and the strength of an electrolyte relative to the total current density at a fixed applied cathodic potential of −1.0 V vs. RHE.

Keywords: CO 2 reduction; CO 2 conversion; copper kinetics; electrode–electrolyte microenvironment; batch cell/electrolyzer; numerical modeling; sustainable energy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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