Electrochemical CO 2 reduction to fuels and chemicals is a promising approach for CO 2 utilization. Developing highly active, selective, and cost-effective electrocatalysts is the key to the large-scale application of this technology. Here, we report that defective indium/indium oxide heterostructures selectively catalyze CO 2 electroreduction into C 1 products in a broad potential range from −0.7 to −1.2 V vs RHE in aqueous media with the faradaic efficiency approaching 100%. This electrocatalyst enables an efficient CO 2 -to-formate conversion with excellent selectivity (up to 93%), activity (up to 50.8 mA cm –2 ), and durability (>25 h). The collaboration between metallic In and In oxide of the heterostructures attributes to the boosted electrochemical CO 2 reduction: Metallic In mainly facilitates formate production, while In oxide suppresses the competing hydrogen evolution reaction. This study highlights the integration of different functional components/defects into heterostructures as an effective strategy for enhancing CO 2 electrocatalysis.
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Yang et al. (2020) studied this question.