(62g) CO2 Electrocatalysis: Gde Reactor Standards and Protocols

Mitigation of the rising levels of carbon dioxide (CO₂) is of paramount importance to curb the rate of global climate change. Unfortunately, without providing economically viable routes to remove CO₂ from an emission stream, the atmospheric concentration of CO₂ has continued to increase. To this end, electrocatalytic CO₂ reduction has been developed over the past 30 years to inexpensively convert CO₂ into valuable chemical feedstocks, such as carbon monoxide, ethanol, acetic acid or ethylene, thereby revalorising an otherwise polluting gas.

Over the past 3 years, progress in CO₂ reduction electrolysis has rapidly accelerated due to the wide adoption of gas diffusion electrodes; porous catalytic surfaces that allow CO₂ to flow directly at the interface between electrode and electrolyte. This has finally pushed CO₂-electrolyser technology into an operating regime suitable for profitable operation and as such it is now essential that the standards and protocols of gas diffusion electrode fabrication and operation are universally understood.

This talk will discuss nomenclature, taxonomy, experimental preparation and benchmarking currently used in the analysis of gas diffusion electrodes to produce both C₁ and multi-carbon products. The aim is to ultimately provide a blueprint for building and reporting the activity of a vapor-fed gas diffusion electrode by focusing on the most effective state-of-the-art electrode designs. The presentation will include data from collaborative experiments between the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Stanford University and the University of Toronto that tested six standard gas diffusion electrode designs at each site. These results are intended to serve as a standardised dataset for all future electrode developments.

The talk will conclude by discussion of the potential of gas diffusion electrodes in the development of large-scale CO₂ reduction electrolysers and the final hurdles of efficiency and stability that must be addressed to convert CO₂ at scale.