Impurity-Resistant CO2 Reduction Using Reactive Carbon Solutions

Electrolyzers that electrochemically convert aqueous (bi)­carbonate solutions (solutions containing captured CO2, or “reactive carbon solutions”) into commodity chemicals couple CO2 capture with CO2 conversion. Industrial exhaust streams contain nitrogen oxides (NO x ) and sulfur oxides (SO x ) that...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:ACS energy letters 2023-04, Vol.8 (4), p.1779-1784
Main Authors: Pimlott, Douglas J. D., Jewlal, Andrew, Mowbray, Benjamin A. W., Berlinguette, Curtis P.
Format: Article
Language:English
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:Electrolyzers that electrochemically convert aqueous (bi)­carbonate solutions (solutions containing captured CO2, or “reactive carbon solutions”) into commodity chemicals couple CO2 capture with CO2 conversion. Industrial exhaust streams contain nitrogen oxides (NO x ) and sulfur oxides (SO x ) that form redox-active anions in reactive carbon solutions that can interfere with downstream CO2 reduction. We therefore designed experiments to test how impurities produced from the dissolution of NO x (NO2 – and NO3 –) and SO x (SO3 2– and SO4 2–) impact the electrochemical conversion of (bi)­carbonate to CO. We found that CO production was unaffected by SO x compounds in a 3.0 M KHCO3 feedstock, but 2000 ppm of NO x impurities decreased CO selectivity from ∼60% to
ISSN:2380-8195
2380-8195
DOI:10.1021/acsenergylett.3c00133