Electrocatalytic selective oxidation of ethylene glycol: A concise review of catalyst development and reaction mechanism with comparison to thermocatalytic oxidation process

As an important water and seawater degradable plastic monomer, glycolic acid can be synthesized by selective oxidation of ethylene glycol. This review recapitulates recent advances in electrocatalytic ethylene glycol oxidation reaction (EGOR) from the aspects of catalytic performance and reaction mechanism. For catalytic performance evaluation, target product yield and space-time yield are correlated and analyzed for electrocatalytic and thermocatalytic EGOR systems. To elucidate the rationale behind the electrocatalytic selective oxidation of ethylene glycol, previous works using in situ Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, online differential electrochemical mass spectrometry, ion chromatography, and theoretical calculations to investigate EGOR are systematically reviewed. Finally, the advantages of electrocatalytic EGOR are summarized by comparing electrocatalytic and thermocatalytic processes.