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Electrochemical CO2 reduction

Boosting chemical and fuel production

Nature Catalysis volume 3, pages 474–475 (2020)Cite this article

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Catalysts are the heart of CO2 electroreduction technology. Now, a catalyst has been developed that converts CO2 into C2+ products with very high selectivity, stability, and energy efficiency at industrially relevant current densities.

Carbon dioxide (CO2) electroreduction provides an attractive approach to store intermittent renewable energy in the form of chemical fuels and to upgrade CO2 — a greenhouse gas — into value-added products1. Practical application of this approach requires an electrochemical system that selectively converts CO2 into economically desirable products such as ethylene and ethanol with high energy efficiency and high stability at current densities above 100 mA cm–2 (refs. 1,2).

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Fig. 1: CO2 electroreduction on F–Cu catalysts loaded on a gas diffusion electrode.

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  1. Department of Chemical Engineering, Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada

    Cao-Thang Dinh

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  1. Cao-Thang Dinh
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Correspondence to Cao-Thang Dinh.

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The author declares no competing interests.

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Dinh, CT. Boosting chemical and fuel production. Nat Catal 3, 474–475 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41929-020-0467-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41929-020-0467-4

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