Harnessing Contact Electrification and Static Charge for Chemical Reactions: Fundamentals and Applications of Contact Electrocatalysis

The chemical industry is the largest industrial energy consumer and the third-largest emitter of CO2 globally. Despite efforts to enhance energy efficiency, many chemical reactions still require significant external energy due to fundamental thermodynamic barriers. Thus, transitioning to a sustainable chemical industry requires new renewable energy or catalytic technologies that reduce energy demand. In catalytic systems, flowing liquids, moving parts, and gas separation mean local static charge is often generated on the nanoscale. This review explores the static charge formation at solid–solid, solid–liquid, and solid–gas interfaces, such as those that occur in catalytic reactions, and then extends this discussion to a deeper focus on how these generated static charges can be used for catalysis, including electrostatic catalysis, static charge electrochemistry, and contact electrocatalysis (CEC). CEC, where motion-induced charge separation leads to local static charge formation, is then specifically examined, exploring why and how it has emerged as an exciting tool to enable these green chemical transformations. The focus is to highlight the most recent developments in CEC, with mechanistic interpretation, factors that affect CEC performance, and emerging applications, and to provide outlook and guidance for the field─specifically highlighting the need to build structure–property relationships for CEC performance and static charge formation for target chemical reactions.