Proceedings of nanoGe Fall Meeting19 (NFM19)
Publication date: 18th July 2019
The CO2 electrochemical (EC) reduction is considered a promising technology for the storage and reutilization of CO2 from both economic and environmental points of view. The competitive H2 evolution side-reaction in all aqueous-electrolyte-based CO2 EC reduction proccesses, can be exploited in a competitive approach for the production of syngas with different CO/H2 ratios. Syngas a mixture for which there are well-established options for further processing to obtain more reduced products, such as alcohols and hydrocarbons (e.g. via heterogeneous Fischer-Tropsch catalysis) [1]. In this work, TiO2 nanotubes (NTs) were grown by anodic oxidation of Ti foils and were then decorated with Ag nanoparticles (NPs) deposited by sputtering with a low loading (<20 wt%) [2]. Due to their quasi 1D structure, the TiO2 NTs provides a higher surface area and better electron transport properties than other Ti-based substrates, like Ti foil and TiO2 NPs. These results were confirmed by electrochemical techniques (CV, EIS, electrochemical active surface area) and chemical-physical analysis (FESEM, TEM, EDS). Additionally, the TiO2 NTs play a role in enhancing the stability of the CO2·- intermediate thanks to the titania (TiIV/TiIII) redox behaviour, leading to an improvement of the CO production in the Ag/TiO2 NTs electrodes. The best Ag NPs/TiO2 NTs sample outperform Ag-decorated TiO2 NPs (see Fig. 1) [2], achieving a molar ratio of CO/H2 of 1:2 which is suitable as feedstock for methanol production. A noteworthy current density of -65 mA/cm2 was achieved for the EC CO2 reduction at -1.6V vs SHE, which can be considered high with respect to the experiments carried out with bulk noble metal-based electrodes. This work opens new doors for using nanostructures of metal oxides like titania as a support for electrocatalyst in CO2 reduction. However, the stability of the electrocatalyst and production rate of syngas are still a challenge that needs to be resolved to achieve an industrial relevant scale.
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