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Chemical Engineering Journal:Bifunctional copper-cobalt spinel electrocatalysts for efficient tandem-like nitrate reduction to ammonia
Release time:2022-11-09 Hits:

Electrocatalytic reduction of nitrate (NO3 , NO3RR) provides an effective strategy to mitigate water pollution of human-caused but obtain high-value ammonia (NH3) under environmental conditions based on renewable energy. In this study, we prepared porous carbon nanofibers (CFs)-supported CuCo2O4 composite (CuCo2O4/CFs) electrocatalyst by electrospun-pyrolysis method for efficient conversion of NO3 to NH3. The experimental results revealed that the CFs could contribute to charge transfer and inhibit the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), which preferentially catalyzes NO3 -to- NO2. On the other hand, internally confined CuCo2O4 nanoparticles conduce to stabilize adsorbed nitrite intermediate (*NO2) for further conversion to NH3. The CuCo2O4/CFs exhibit the maximum NH3 Faradaic efficiency of 81.9 % at − 0.3 V versus reversible hydrogen electrode (vs RHE) with a yield rate of 394.5 mmol h−1 g−1 at ambient conditions. The theoretical analysis demonstrated that the *NH3 desorption is a potential rate-determining step (RDS) with an uphill energy change of 0.76 eV over CuCo2O4. Furthermore, CuCo2O4/CFs as difunctional catalysts, coupling NO3 reduction with methanol oxidation (NO3RR||MOR) to substitute water splitting simultaneously at a low voltage. This work provides a strategy for combining NH3 electrosynthesis with methanol oxidation to high value-added chemicals under ambient conditions.