The growing urgency to mitigate the impacts of climate change has spurred extensive research into carbon capture and utilization technologies, with a particular emphasis on the electrochemical reduction of CO₂ (CO₂RR) to value-added chemicals.
1 Among the various strategies explored is converting CO₂ to C
2+ products. Copper-based catalysts have long been recognized as the most promising materials for CO₂RR, owing to their ability to catalyze the formation of C–C bonds.
2 However, challenges remain in improving these catalysts' selectivity, efficiency, and stability, particularly in producing C
2+ products. To address these challenges, the research has turned to making the interface of copper with alkaline earth metals to enhance the catalytic performance of copper in CO₂RR.
3 In this work, we introduced the novel synthetic protocols to make the interface of Barium Oxide/Copper oxide (BaO/CuO) on the surface of 3-phase boundary through physical vapor deposition, followed by coprecipitation and oxidation processes. The as-prepared catalyst of BaO/CuO on the 3-phase boundary was directly applied as a cathode of the zero-gap electrolyzer for CO
2RR. Furthermore, a zero-gap electrolyzer design for a large area of 3 cm
2, which minimizes the distance between the anode and cathode, facilitates improved ionic transport and enhanced reaction kinetics. Our developed catalyst of BaO/CuO exhibited 40%±3 of ethylene and total C
2+ products of 70% at a current density of 166mA/cm
2. Furthermore, the results for doping of copper with alkaline earth metals (Ca, Sr, and Mg), including their performance for CO
2RR, will be presented for the sake of a comparative study. We believe our research findings offer a promising pathway towards sustainable CO
2 valorization and electrochemical CO
2 reduction to fuel products.
References
1 Tabassum et al, Chem Catalysis, (2022). 1561-1593
2 Tabassum et al, Appl. Catal.B, 365 (2025). 124922
3 Sargent et al, Nature Catalysis 5 (2022). 1081-1088
