TY - JOUR
T1 - Efficient conversion of low-concentration nitrate sources into ammonia on a Ru-dispersed Cu nanowire electrocatalyst
AU - Chen, Feng Yang
AU - Wu, Zhen Yu
AU - Gupta, Srishti
AU - Rivera, Daniel J.
AU - Lambeets, Sten V.
AU - Pecaut, Stephanie
AU - Kim, Jung Yoon Timothy
AU - Zhu, Peng
AU - Finfrock, Y. Zou
AU - Meira, Debora Motta
AU - King, Graham
AU - Gao, Guanhui
AU - Xu, Wenqian
AU - Cullen, David A.
AU - Zhou, Hua
AU - Han, Yimo
AU - Perea, Daniel E.
AU - Muhich, Christopher L.
AU - Wang, Haotian
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited.
PY - 2022/7
Y1 - 2022/7
N2 - Electrochemically converting nitrate ions, a widely distributed nitrogen source in industrial wastewater and polluted groundwater, into ammonia represents a sustainable route for both wastewater treatment and ammonia generation. However, it is currently hindered by low catalytic activities, especially under low nitrate concentrations. Here we report a high-performance Ru-dispersed Cu nanowire catalyst that delivers an industrial-relevant nitrate reduction current of 1 A cm–2 while maintaining a high NH3 Faradaic efficiency of 93%. More importantly, this high nitrate-reduction catalytic activity enables over a 99% nitrate conversion into ammonia, from an industrial wastewater level of 2,000 ppm to a drinkable water level <50 ppm, while still maintaining an over 90% Faradaic efficiency. Coupling the nitrate reduction effluent stream with an air stripping process, we successfully obtained high purity solid NH4Cl and liquid NH3 solution products, which suggests a practical approach to convert wastewater nitrate into valuable ammonia products. Density functional theory calculations reveal that the highly dispersed Ru atoms provide active nitrate reduction sites and the surrounding Cu sites can suppress the main side reaction, the hydrogen evolution reaction.
AB - Electrochemically converting nitrate ions, a widely distributed nitrogen source in industrial wastewater and polluted groundwater, into ammonia represents a sustainable route for both wastewater treatment and ammonia generation. However, it is currently hindered by low catalytic activities, especially under low nitrate concentrations. Here we report a high-performance Ru-dispersed Cu nanowire catalyst that delivers an industrial-relevant nitrate reduction current of 1 A cm–2 while maintaining a high NH3 Faradaic efficiency of 93%. More importantly, this high nitrate-reduction catalytic activity enables over a 99% nitrate conversion into ammonia, from an industrial wastewater level of 2,000 ppm to a drinkable water level <50 ppm, while still maintaining an over 90% Faradaic efficiency. Coupling the nitrate reduction effluent stream with an air stripping process, we successfully obtained high purity solid NH4Cl and liquid NH3 solution products, which suggests a practical approach to convert wastewater nitrate into valuable ammonia products. Density functional theory calculations reveal that the highly dispersed Ru atoms provide active nitrate reduction sites and the surrounding Cu sites can suppress the main side reaction, the hydrogen evolution reaction.
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U2 - 10.1038/s41565-022-01121-4
DO - 10.1038/s41565-022-01121-4
M3 - Article
C2 - 35501378
AN - SCOPUS:85129312733
SN - 1748-3387
VL - 17
SP - 759
EP - 767
JO - Nature nanotechnology
JF - Nature nanotechnology
IS - 7
ER -