Efficient Electrochemical N2 Reduction to NH3 on MoN Nanosheets Array under Ambient Conditions

By Ling Zhang, Xuqiang Ji, Xiang Ren, Yonglan Luo, Xifeng Shi, Abdullah M. Asiri, Baozhan Zheng, Xuping Sun. ACS Sustainable Chemistry and Engineering, 2018

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Electrochemical N2 reduction reaction (NRR) under ambient conditions offers us an environmentally friendly route for artificial synthesis of NH3. However, up to now, few noble-metal-free electrocatalysts with satisfactory catalytic activities have been explored. In this Letter, we demonstrate that MoN nanosheets array on carbon cloth (MoN NA/CC) acts as a high-performance NRR electrocatalyst toward NH3 electrosynthesis in 0.1 M HCl under ambient conditions. This catalyst achieves a large NH3 yield of 3.01 × 10–10 mo1 s–1 cm–2 and a Faradaic efficiency of 1.15% at −0.3 V vs reversible hydrogen electrode with strong electrochemical durability and selectivity. Density functional theory calculations reveal that MoN NA/CC catalyzes NRR via the Mars–van Krevelen mechanism.

Subfields: Catalysis, Organic Chemistry, Renewable Energy, Sustainability and the Environment

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/bde54d234db401d387d45ecdc4c55e221edad684