Pb-rich Cu grain boundary sites for selective CO-to-n-propanol electroconversion

Wenzhe Niu, Zheng Chen, Wen Guo, Wei Mao, Yi Liu, Yunna Guo, Jingzhao Chen, Rui Huang, Lin Kang, Yiwen Ma, Qisheng Yan, Jinyu Ye, Chunyu Cui, Liqiang Zhang, Peng Wang, Xin Xu () and Bo Zhang ()
Additional contact information
Wenzhe Niu: Fudan University
Zheng Chen: Fudan University
Wen Guo: Fudan University
Wei Mao: Nanjing University
Yi Liu: Fudan University
Yunna Guo: Yanshan University
Jingzhao Chen: Yanshan University
Rui Huang: Fudan University
Lin Kang: Fudan University
Yiwen Ma: Fudan University
Qisheng Yan: Fudan University
Jinyu Ye: Xiamen University
Chunyu Cui: Fudan University
Liqiang Zhang: Yanshan University
Peng Wang: Nanjing University
Xin Xu: Fudan University
Bo Zhang: Fudan University

Nature Communications, 2023, vol. 14, issue 1, 1-12

Abstract: Abstract Electrochemical carbon monoxide (CO) reduction to high-energy-density fuels provides a potential way for chemical production and intermittent energy storage. As a valuable C3 species, n-propanol still suffers from a relatively low Faradaic efficiency (FE), sluggish conversion rate and poor stability. Herein, we introduce an “atomic size misfit” strategy to modulate active sites, and report a facile synthesis of a Pb-doped Cu catalyst with numerous atomic Pb-concentrated grain boundaries. Operando spectroscopy studies demonstrate that these Pb-rich Cu-grain boundary sites exhibit stable low coordination and can achieve a stronger CO adsorption for a higher surface CO coverage. Using this Pb-Cu catalyst, we achieve a CO-to-n-propanol FE (FEpropanol) of 47 ± 3% and a half-cell energy conversion efficiency (EE) of 25% in a flow cell. When applied in a membrane electrode assembly (MEA) device, a stable FEpropanol above 30% and the corresponding full-cell EE of over 16% are maintained for over 100 h with the n-propanol partial current above 300 mA (5 cm2 electrode). Furthermore, operando X-ray absorption spectroscopy and theoretical studies reveal that the structurally-flexible Pb-Cu surface can adaptively stabilize the key intermediates, which strengthens the *CO binding while maintaining the C–C coupling ability, thus promoting the CO-to-n-propanol conversion.

Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-40689-w Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:14:y:2023:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-023-40689-w

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-023-40689-w

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().