Electrochemical oxygen reduction to hydrogen peroxide at practical rates in strong acidic media

Xiao Zhang (), Xunhua Zhao, Peng Zhu, Zachary Adler, Zhen-Yu Wu, Yuanyue Liu () and Haotian Wang ()
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Xiao Zhang: Rice University
Xunhua Zhao: The University of Texas at Austin
Peng Zhu: Rice University
Zachary Adler: Rice University
Zhen-Yu Wu: Rice University
Yuanyue Liu: The University of Texas at Austin
Haotian Wang: Rice University

Nature Communications, 2022, vol. 13, issue 1, 1-11

Abstract: Abstract Electrochemical oxygen reduction to hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) in acidic media, especially in proton exchange membrane (PEM) electrode assembly reactors, suffers from low selectivity and the lack of low-cost catalysts. Here we present a cation-regulated interfacial engineering approach to promote the H2O2 selectivity (over 80%) under industrial-relevant generation rates (over 400 mA cm−2) in strong acidic media using just carbon black catalyst and a small number of alkali metal cations, representing a 25-fold improvement compared to that without cation additives. Our density functional theory simulation suggests a “shielding effect” of alkali metal cations which squeeze away the catalyst/electrolyte interfacial protons and thus prevent further reduction of generated H2O2 to water. A double-PEM solid electrolyte reactor was further developed to realize a continuous, selective (∼90%) and stable (over 500 hours) generation of H2O2 via implementing this cation effect for practical applications.

Date: 2022
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DOI: 10.1038/s41467-022-30337-0

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