Highly selective nitrate reduction to ammonia on CoO/Cu foam via constructing interfacial electric field to tune adsorption of reactants

Electrochemical reduction of nitrate to ammonia (ERNA) is a new process to recycle nitrogen resource from nitrate polluted wastewater. Nevertheless, how to optimize active sites on electrode to improve activity is a key challenge. Here, we proposed that building interfacial electric field could enhance ERNA. XPS analysis, DFT calculations and in-situ electrochemical measurements confirmed that high Fermi level of Cu (1.09 eV) and low valence band maximum of CoO (−0.23 eV) formed interfacial electric field in CoO/Cu electrode to transfer electron from Cu to CoO, resulting in positively charged Cu (+0.01 eV) increase nitrate adsorption, whereas negatively charged CoO (−0.007 eV) decrease NO adsorption, improving removal and selectivity greatly for boosting ERNA. Eventually, CoO/Cu foam (Co/Cu ratio of 3.05) achieved the highest ammonia yield of 4.3 mg cm−2 h−1 with faradic efficiency of 96.7 %, surpassing Cu foam (1.2 mg cm−2 h−1) and CoO/Ni foam (1.3 mg cm−2 h−1) electrodes.