Anodized silver plate electrode for carbon dioxide reduction Li Qin Zhou, Chen Ling, Hongfei Jia Materials Research Department, Toyota Research Institute of North America, 1555 Woodridge Ave., Ann Arbor, MI 48105, USA. During the last few decades, the emissions of carbon dioxide have been dramatically increased to the highest level of the last 20 million years, causing radical and largely unpredictable changes in the environment. Research has revealed that CO2 can be converted by electrochemical reduction into CO forming energy-rich products (syngas), offering an efficient path for not only CO2 remediation but also an alternative energy source. The significance of catalysts in CO2 reduction process has been widely recognized in recent years, and extensive efforts have been made to search for cost-effective, earth-abundant catalytic materials with high efficiency and stability. Researchers have identified several potential catalysts that are able to reduce CO2 electrochemically. Among them, gold was recognized to be the most efficient catalyst towards CO production whereas copper exhibited a poor CO selectivity. However, gold is not suitable for large-scale applications owing to its low abundance and high cost. Silver-based electrocatalysts can selectively promote the reduction of CO2 to CO at room temperature and are receiving more attention recently as it costs much less than gold. However, the common polycrystalline silver electrodes require a large overpotential for CO2 reduction and show poor CO selectivity at low overpotentials. Developing new means to enhance its catalytic performance is essential to achieve a cost-effective process with high efficiency and selectivity. We have recently employed anodization treatment on silver electrode and found that the CO selectivity and efficiency were greatly improved. Details about the anodization, the characterization of the anodized electrode materials, structural and physiochemical properties and the evaluation of catalytic performance are presented in this work. Possible catalytic mechanisms are discussed as well.

Anodized silver plate electrode for carbon dioxide reduction

249th National Meeting (2015)

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