Engineering regulated catalysts for electrocatalytically driven CO2 preparation of ethanol

Electrocatalytic CO2RR is an ideal method. It is capable of converting CO2 into usable fuels and valuable chemical products. Electrocatalytic CO2RR produces a wide range of chemicals. Of these, ethanol (EtOH) is favored for its wide industrial and commercial value. However, electrocatalytic CO2RR preparation of EtOH involves C-C coupling reactions and is a multi-electron transfer process. For this reason, the efficient electrochemical conversion of EtOH by CO2RR remains a great challenge. The preparation of EtOH by electrocatalytic CO2RR involves the interference of a competing hydrogen evolution reaction as well as some other reaction intermediates. This limits the improvement of Faraday efficiency of ethanol (FEEtOH) and the current density of ethanol (JEtOH). To improve ethanol selectivity, the researchers designed and modified the catalysts using engineering regulation effects such as reaction conditions engineering regulation, surface engineering regulation, interfacial engineering regulation, and single atom engineering regulation, and achieved excellent results. Therefore, it is important to understand the key factors affecting the catalyst activity by different engineering regulations and to apply a combination of engineering regulations to the catalyst development. Therefore, this paper firstly provides a comprehensive summary of the catalysts applied for the preparation of EtOH by electrocatalytic CO2RR, including two major categories of catalysts containing pure metal active components and catalysts without pure metal active components. Subsequently, the main effects of engineering modulation on catalyst activity are analyzed and summarized in detail, respectively. Finally, the future challenges and development prospects of electrocatalytic CO2RR for EtOH preparation were highlighted.