Unveiling the formic acid dehydrogenation dynamics steered by Strength-Controllable internal electric field from barium titanate

Formic acid is a desirable liquid hydrogen storage compound for solving transport and storage problems of hydrogen for onboard fuel cells. Optimizing adsorption/desorption energy of intermediates can directly modulate the performance of Pd catalysts in formic acid dehydrogenation (FAD). Herein, we introduce internal electric field with controllable strength to regulate the adsorption/desorption of intermediates on Pd. Non-ferroelectric cubic-phase barium titanate (CBT) is heat-treated at high temperature to obtain ferroelectric tetragonal-phase barium titanate (TBT(C)), which exhibits internal electric field. The strength of the internal electric field is successfully adjusted by heat treatment at different temperatures. The size of Pd nanoparticles is restricted between 2.2 and 2.7 nm, and the electronic effect of Pd is effectively eliminated by coating TBT(C) with mesoporous carbon shell (TBT(C)@SC). Experimental results prove that the internal electric field promotes the desorption of hydrogen on Pd. Pd/TBT(C)@SC-800 obtained by heat treatment at 800 °C, with the optimal internal electric field strength, exhibits high activity and hydrogen selectivity for FAD. This work provides a new strategy for designing FAD catalysts.