CuO/ZnO Composite Electrocatalyst: Preparation and Reduction of CO2 to Syngas

The reduction of carbon dioxide (CO2) to syngas (a mixture of CO and H-2) can not only realize the carbon cycle and decrease the greenhouse effect but also alleviate the energy crisis. Design of catalyst is the key to realize CO2 resource utilization. Herein, CuO and CuO/ZnO composite were prepared by metal ion co-precipitation method, and their performance of electrochemical CO2 reduction to syngas under different potentials was investigated by adjusting the catalyst components. The results show that the introduction of zinc (Zn) species can decrease the adsorption intensity of intermediate CO2 center dot- on the catalyst, which leads to the decrease of Faraday efficiency (FE) of CO and the increase of FE of H-2, thus achieving controllable regulation of CO/H-2 in the range of 1/1-1/4 under different applied electrochemical potential. In particular, the total FE of syngas CO/H-2 is up to 84% when the ratio of Cu to Zn in the precursor solution is 1 : 2.