Abstract: Producing fuels and chemicals using renewable electricity holds the promise to enable a truly sustainable circular economy based on sustainably produced carriers of electrical energy and sustainably produced chemicals. To date, the vast majority of electrocatalytic reactions are limited to the transformation of small inorganic molecules such as CO2, H2O, N2, as well as the oxidation and reduction of alcohols. However, comprehensive electrification of the chemical industry will require electrocatalytic reactions that can promote the central transformations that make up today’s industry.
In this presentation, I will show how fundamental understanding of the interfacial processes occurring in electrocatalytic reactions [1] can be exploited to expand the reaction scope of electrocatalysis to the transformation of complex substrates of industrial importance. Specifically, I will show how our group was able to use rational control of the electrochemical potential applied to electrodes to independently control the adsorption of n-alkane substrates, their transformation once bound to the surface, and the desorption of reaction products from the electrocatalyst [2]. This precise control over electrocatalytic reactivity allowed us to fragment ethane and butane to methane at room temperature. We were further able to exploit these techniques to understand the mechanism of room-temperature alkane fragmentation and then to gain control over the individual catalytic steps occurring at the electrode surface [3].
I will further discuss how, at a fundamental level, applied voltages control the rate of electrocatalytic reactions. To provide insight, we measured CO2 reduction activation energies on Ag electrodes in the presence of different cations. Based on previous reports that structural modifications to imidazolium cations control the rate of CO2 reduction reactions, we expected that these structural modifications change the activation energy of the reaction. However, our findings revealed a much more fascinating picture of the impact of imidazolium cations on CO2 reduction rates, pointing to an important role for potential-induced modifications of interfacial entropy in controlling electrocatalytic reaction rates [4].
References
- Schreier, M., Kenis, P., Che, F., and Hall, A.S. ACS Energy Lett. 8, 9, 3935–3940 (2023).
- Bakshi, H.B.‡ , Lucky, C. ‡, Chen H-S., Schreier, M. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 145, 13742–13749 (2023). (‡ equal contribution)
- Lucky, C., Jiang, S., Shih, C.-R., Zavala, V., Schreier, M. Nature Catalysis 145, 1021–1031 (2024).
Bio: Prof. Schreier received his bachelor’s degree in Chemistry and Chemical Engineering from EPFL and his master’s degree in Chemical and Bioengineering from ETH Zurich. During his studies, Schreier worked on Li-Ion Batteries at BASF and investigated Fischer-Tropsch refining catalysts at the University of Alberta. His master’s research was performed in the laboratory of Sossina Haile at Caltech, where he designed materials for fuel cell electrodes. He subsequently joined the laboratory of Michael Grätzel at EPFL, where he developed electrocatalysts and devices for the sunlight-driven conversion of CO2 to fuels. Following his passion for fundamental electrochemistry, he moved to MIT, where he worked with Yogesh Surendranath as an SNSF Postdoctoral Fellow. He subsequently joined the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering at the University of Wisconsin-Madison as the Richard H. Soit Assistant Professor. Together with his research group, Prof. Schreier works to understand how the structure of the electrochemical interface and the surface chemistry of catalytic materials influence the fundamental mechanisms which drive chemical transformations using electrical energy. While working at the University of Wisconsin, he has received the Beckman Young Investigator Award, a Packard Fellowship for Science and Engineering, and an NSF CAREER Award. He was a Scialog fellow, a Kavli Fellow (National Academy of Science) and has participated in several Frontiers of Engineering meetings of the National Academy of Engineering. Apart from electrochemistry, Prof. Schreier is passionate about Modern Art, energy systems, technologies of all kinds and policy.