A tunable bioinspired process of SnO2 NPs synthesis for electrochemical CO2-into-formate conversion

The present work aims at the bioinspired synthesis of SnO2 NPs, labeled as SnO2(bio) NPs using S. edule fruit. A mechanistic route of synthesis of SnO2 NPs from its inorganic precursor has been proposed herewith. Carbon paper decorated SnO2(bio) NPs and its calcined counterpart SnO2(bio)-800 NPs (800 degrees C) were employed for electrochemical CO2 reduction. Both SnO2(bio) NPs and SnO2(bio)-800 NPs were active towards CO2 to formate (HCOO-) as the single product, in the liquid phase of 0.5 M KHCO3 aqueous electrolyte and the maximum faradaic efficiency reached to 75.6-84.0%, respectively for 1 h of the chronoamperometric test. The predominant crystalline (110) facet in SnO2(bio)-800 NPs might have caused a significant boost in faradaic efficiency for formate formation.