Phosphate-Derived Copper-Based Catalysts for Efficient CO2 Reduction to Multicarbon Products

The reconstruction of Cu-based catalysts would greatly affect the carbon dioxide electrocatalytic reduction reaction (CO2ERR) activity and product selectivity toward C2+ production. Herein, we report phosphate-derived copper-based catalysts (PD-CuOx/C) for efficient CO2ERR toward C2+ production synthesized via in situ reconstruction. Detailed studies about the morphology and structure evolution during reconstruction procedures of PD-CuOx/C samples are conducted, revealing the formation of copper phosphate nanosheets as well as the corresponding well-dispersed Cu nanoparticles resulting from electroreduction. Such well-dispersed Cu nanoparticles in PD-CuOx/C promote the C–C coupling of key CO2ERR intermediates toward C2+ productions, resulting in an elevated FEC2+ of 45% compared to referencing non-phosphate-derived CuOx/C samples. The facilitated CO2ERR performance to form C2+ products is attributed to not only the phosphate-derived Cu essence but also the stabilized Cu+ species in PD-CuOx/C. This work provides inspiration and encourages headway to design new derived Cu electrocatalysts with efficient CO2ERR ability toward high-value C2+ chemical productions.