Highly efficient electrooxidation of biomass-based 5-hydroxymethylfurfural to 2,5-furandicarboxylic acid over a Cu–Ni bimetal–phytic acid hybrid electrocatalyst

High-performance copper/nickel@phytic acid hybrids (Cu-Ni(x)@PA) using plant-originated phytic acid as a building block were constructed for the electrooxidation of 5-hydroxymethylfurfural to 2,5-furandicarboxylic acid. The optimized Cu-Ni(2)@PA shows excellent performance with high faradaic efficiency (96.7%) and selectivity (97.5%). The mechanism behind such high efficiency was revealed.