Interfacial engineering of SnO2/Bi2O2CO3 heterojunction on heteroatoms-doped carbon for high-performance CO2 electroreduction to formate
Danni Wang, Tingting Sun, Lianbin Xu, Lei Gong, Baotong Chen, Pianpian Zhang, Tianyu Zheng, Qingmei Xu, Houhe Pan, Yuexing Zhang, Jianzhuang Jiang
Abstract
Electrochemical CO2 reduction is a viable, economical, and sustainable method to transform atmospheric CO2 into carbon-based fuels and effectively reduce climate change and the energy crisis. Constructing robust catalysts through interface engineering is significant for electrocatalytic CO2 reduction (ECR) but remains a grand challenge. Herein, SnO2/Bi2O2CO3 heterojunction on N,S-codoped-carbon (SnO2/BOC@NSC) with efficient ECR performance was firstly constructed by a facile synthetic strategy. When the SnO2/BOC@NSC was utilized in ECR, it exhibits a large formic acid (HCOOH) partial current density (JHCOOH) of 86.7 mA·cm−2 at −1.2 V versus reversible hydrogen electrode (RHE) and maximum Faradaic efficiency (FE) of HCOOH (90.75% at −1.2 V versus RHE), respectively. Notably, the FEHCOOH of SnO2/BOC@NSC is higher than 90% in the flow cell and the JHCOOH of SnO2/BOC@NSC can achieve 200 mA·cm−2 at −0.8 V versus RHE to meet the requirements of industrialization level. The comparative experimental analysis and in-situ X-ray absorption fine structure reveal that the excellent ECR performance can be ascribed to the synergistic effect of SnO2/BOC heterojunction, which enhances the activation of CO2 molecules and improves electron transfer. This work provides an efficient SnO2-based heterojunction catalyst for effective formate production and offers a novel approach for the construction of new types of metal oxide heterostructures for other catalytic applications.