Significant role of reconstructed character on CuO-derived catalyst for enhanced electrocatalytic reduction of CO2 to multicarbon products

Developing high efficient electrocatalysts for converting CO2 to value-added chemicals and fuels, especially multicarbon products with higher energy density, has been intensively pursued for in electrochemical CO2 reduction reaction (CO2 RR) progress. Here, mesoporous CuO nanostructures were obtained by a two-step synthetic method and used as the catalyst for CO2RR with the presence of iodine anions. At -1.0 V vs. RHE in 1.0 M KI, the total Faradaic efficiency (FE) of C-2 reduction products approaches the maximum of nearly 60%. Our controlled experimental results reveal that the reconstructed small crystalline Cut nanoparticles play significant roles in promoting the selectivity towards C-2 products, which was attributed to the stabilization of Cu(+)by I- anion and exposure of abundant unsaturated coordinated sites of Cu+ on the reconstructed surface. Our findings provide a new insight on the crucial role of surface reconstruction for the high FE of C-2 products. (C) 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.