The Effect of Electrolyte pH and Impurities on the Stability of Electrolytic Bicarbonate Conversion.

Electrolytic bicarbonate conversion holds the promise to integrate carbon capture directly with electrochemical conversion. Most research has focused on improving the faradaic efficiencies of the system, however, the stability of the system has not been thoroughly addressed. Here, we find that the bulk electrolyte pH has a large effect on the selectivity, where a higher pH results in a lower selectivity.

The Effect of Salts on the CO Reduction Product Distribution in an Aprotic Electrolyte.

Electrochemical CO reduction in non-aqueous solvents is promising due to the increased CO solubility of organic-based electrolytes compared to aqueous electrolytes. Here the effect of nine different salts in propylene carbonate (PC) on the CO reduction product distribution of polycrystalline Cu is investigated. Three different cations (tetraethylammonium (TEA), tetrabutylammonium (TBA), and tetrahexylammonium (THA)) and three different anions (chloride (Cl), tetrafluoroborate (BF), and hexafluorophosphate (PF)) were used.