Efficient electroreduction of CO₂to C₂-C₃products on Cu/Cu₂O@N-doped graphene

CO2 is the main gas that causes the greenhouse effect, so electrochemical reduction of CO2 can be regarded as a solution to alleviate the climate crisis. In this study, a simple metal-organic frameworks (MOFs)-derivatized strategy was adopted to prepare electrocatalyst, where MOF-199 and N-doped graphene (NG), as precursors, were electroreduced to obtain Cu/Cu2O@N-doped graphene (Cu/Cu2O@NG) materials for efficient CO2 electroreduction to produce C2-C3 products (ethylene, ethanol and n-propanol). A series of Cu/Cu2O@NG materials, especially Cu/Cu2O@NG-2 with a Faraday efficiency of 56 % and corresponding current density of 19.0 mA/cm2 for C2-C3 products, showed a considerably better catalytic performance compared with the MOF-199-derived Cu/Cu2O material. This good performance was mainly attributed to the synergistic effect between the evenly dispersed Cu/Cu2O and NG, leading to good CO2 adsorption capacity, rapid mass transfer and abundant active sites.