Gold-in-copper at low *CO coverage enables efficient electromethanation of CO2

The renewable-electricity-powered CO2 electroreduction reaction provides a promising means to store intermittent renewable energy in the form of valuable chemicals and dispatchable fuels. Renewable methane produced using CO2 electroreduction attracts interest due to the established global distribution network; however, present-day efficiencies and activities remain below those required for practical application. Here we exploit the fact that the suppression of *CO dimerization and hydrogen evolution promotes methane selectivity: we reason that the introduction of Au in Cu favors *CO protonation vs. C-C coupling under low *CO coverage and weakens the *H adsorption energy of the surface, leading to a reduction in hydrogen evolution. We construct experimentally a suite of Au-Cu catalysts and control *CO availability by regulating CO2 concentration and reaction rate. This strategy leads to a 1.6x improvement in the methane:H-2 selectivity ratio compared to the best prior reports operating above 100 mA cm(-2). We as a result achieve a CO2-to-methane Faradaic efficiency (FE) of (56 +/- 2)% at a production rate of (112 +/- 4) mA cm(-2). The electroreduction of CO2 offers a promising approach to produce carbon-neutral methane using renewable electricity. This study shows that the introduction of Au in Cu enables selective methane production from CO2 by regulating *CO availability.

Automated summary

Selective methane production from CO2 can be achieved by introducing Au into Cu to regulate the availability of *CO, leading to higher methane selectivity ratio and CO2-to-methane Faradaic efficiency.