Rutgers scientists have developed catalysts that can convert carbon dioxide – the main cause of global warming – into plastics, fabrics, resins and other products.
The electrocatalysts are the first materials, aside from enzymes, that can turn carbon dioxide and water into carbon building blocks containing one, two, three or four carbon atoms with more than 99 percent efficiency. Two of the products created by the researchers – methylglyoxal (C3) and 2,3-furandiol (C4) – can be used as precursors for plastics, adhesives and pharmaceuticals. Toxic formaldehyde could be replaced by methylglyoxal, which is safer.
The discovery, based on the chemistry of artificial photosynthesis, is detailed in the journal Energy & Environmental Science.
“Our breakthrough could lead to the conversion of carbon dioxide into valuable products and raw materials in the chemical and pharmaceutical industries,” said study senior author Charles Dismukes, Distinguished Professor in the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology and Department of Biochemistry and Microbiology at Rutgers University–New Brunswick. He is also a principal investigator at Rutgers’ Waksman Institute of Microbiology.
Previously, scientists showed that carbon dioxide can be electrochemically converted into methanol, ethanol, methane and ethylene with relatively high yields. But such production is inefficient and too costly to be commercially feasible, according to study lead author Karin Calvinho, a chemistry doctoral student in Rutgers’ School of Graduate Studies.
However, carbon dioxide and water can be electrochemically converted into a wide array of carbon-based products, using five catalysts made of nickel and phosphorus, which are cheap and abundant, she said. The choice of catalyst and other conditions determine how many carbon atoms can be stitched together to make molecules or even generate longer polymers. In general, the longer the carbon chain, the more valuable the product.
Based on their research, the Rutgers scientists earned patents for the electrocatalysts and formed RenewCO₂, a start-up company. The next step is to learn more about the underlying chemical reaction, so it can be used to produce other valuable products such as diols, which are widely used in the polymer industry, or hydrocarbons that can be used as renewable fuels. The Rutgers experts are designing, building and testing electrolyzers for commercial use.
OliverSparrow on November 25th, 2018 at 13:55 UTC »
But this is endothermic, so where does the energy / precursors come from? Why don't you just use the sun, the atmosphere and biomass => syngas => whatever you want? If you are determined to start from CO2, why not go through much less complex hydrogenation, reviewed here?
Gastropod_God on November 25th, 2018 at 12:48 UTC »
My only question is how efficient it is. Electrolysis typically takes quite a bit of energy and how much would it really take to actually make a difference. It’s at least a step in the right direction though.
mvea on November 25th, 2018 at 10:11 UTC »
The title of the post is a copy and paste from the first and third paragraphs of the linked academic press release here:
Journal Reference:
Selective CO2 reduction to C3 and C4 oxyhydrocarbons on nickel phosphides at overpotentials as low as 10 mV
Karin U. D. Calvinho,a Anders B. Laursen,a Kyra M. K. Yap,a Timothy A. Goetjen,a Shinjae Hwang,a Nagarajan Murali,a Bryan Mejia-Sosa,b Alexander Lubarski,a Krishani M. Teeluck,a Eugene S. Hall,a Eric Garfunkel,a Martha Greenblatta and G. Charles Dismukes*ab
Energy & Environmental Science, Issue 9, 2018
DOI: 10.1039/C8EE00936H
Link: https://pubs.rsc.org/en/Content/ArticleLanding/2018/EE/C8EE00936H#!divAbstract
Abstract
We introduce five nickel phosphide compounds as electro-catalysts for the reduction of carbon dioxide in aqueous solution, that achieve unprecedented selectivity to C3 and C4 products (the first such report). Three products: formic acid (C1), methylglyoxal (C3), and 2,3-furandiol (C4), are observed at potentials as low as +50 mV vs. RHE, and at the highest half-reaction energy efficiencies reported to date for any >C1 product (99%). The maximum selectivity for 2,3-furandiol is 71% (faradaic efficiency) at 0.00 V vs. RHE on Ni2P, which is equivalent to an overpotential of 10 mV, with the balance forming methylglyoxal, the proposed reaction intermediate. P content in the series correlates closely with both the total C products and product selectivity, establishing definitive structure–function relationships. We propose a reaction mechanism for the formation of multi-carbon products, involving hydride transfer as the potential-determining step to oxygen-bound intermediates. This unlocks a new and more energy-efficient reduction route that has only been previously observed in nickel-based enzymes. This performance contrasts with simple metallic catalysts that have poor selectivity between multi-carbon products, and which require high overpotentials (>700 mV) to achieve comparable reaction rates.