Abstract:

The gradual increase of CO₂ concentration in the atmosphere is believed to have a profound impact on the global climate and environment. To address this issue, strategies toward effective CO₂ conversion have been developed. As one of the most available strategies, the CO₂ electrochemical reduction approach is particularly attractive because the required energy can be supplied from renewable sources such as solar energy. Electrochemical reduction of CO₂ to chemical feedstocks offers a promising strategy for mitigating CO₂ emissions from anthropogenic activities; however, a critical challenge for this approach is to develop effective electrocatalysts with ultrahigh activity and selectivity. Herein, we report the facile synthesis of a highly efficient and stable atomically isolated nickel catalyst supported by ultrathin nitrogenated carbon nanosheets (Ni-N-C) for CO₂ reduction through pyrolysis of Ni-doped metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) and dicyandiamide (DCDA). MOFs are crystalline and assembled by metal-containing nodes and organic linkers, which have a large specific surface area, tunable pore size and porosity, and highly dispersed unsaturated metal centers. Thus, Ni-doped MOFs were chosen as the precursors to endow Ni-N-C with a porous carbon structure and nickel ions. The nitrogen in Ni-N-C came from DCDA, which acts as the active site to anchor nickel ions. Because of the porous structure and numerous nitrogen sites, the Ni content of Ni-N-C was as high as 7.77% (w). There were two types of nickel ion-containing structures, including Ni⁺-N-C and Ni²⁺-N-C. The structure transformation of the Ni⁺-N-C species from the initial Ni²⁺ (Ni-MOF) was achieved by pyrolysis, and the ratio of Ni⁺ and Ni²⁺ varied with the pyrolysis temperature. Compared to other Ni-N-C prepared at other temperatures, Ni-N-C-800 contained more Ni⁺-N-C species that possessed the optimum *CO binding energy and thus boosted the CO desorption and evolution rate, thereby exhibiting higher CO Faradaic efficiency (FE) up to 94.6% at -0.9 V (vs. the reversible hydrogen electrode, RHE) in 0.1 mol·L^-1 KHCO₃. In addition, it has been found that the rate of CO formation on the Ni-N-C-800 electrode relies on the electrolyte concentration. With the optimal electrolyte concentration, the Ni-N-C-800 electrode achieved a superior Faraday efficiency of > 90% for CO over a wide potential range of -0.77 to -1.07 V (vs. RHE) and displayed a CO FE as high as 97.9% with a current density of 12.6 mA·cm^-2 at -0.77 V (vs. RHE) in 0.5 mol·L^-1 KHCO₃. After testing at -0.77 V for 12 h, the Ni-N-C-800 electrode maintained a CO FE of approximately 95%, indicating superior long-term stability. We believe that this study will contribute to the design and synthesis of highly catalytically active atomically dispersed monovalent metal sites for metal-N-C catalysts.

Key words: Single-atom nickel, Nitrogenated two-dimensional carbon matrix, Ni-N-C catalyst, Pyrolysis, CO₂ reduction, Electrocatalysis, Carbon monoxide