Boron-Doped TiO2 for Efficient Electrocatalytic N2 Fixation to NH3 at Ambient Conditions

• Published in: ACS sustainable chemistry & engineering Vol. 7; no. 1; pp. 117 - 122
• Main Authors: Wang, Yuan, Jia, Kun, Pan, Qi, Xu, Yadi, Liu, Qian, Cui, Guanwei, Guo, Xiaodong, Sun, Xuping
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English; Japanese
• Published: American Chemical Society 07.01.2019
• Subjects: NH3 Synthesis; Ambient conditions; B Doping; N2 Reduction reaction; TiO2
• ISSN: 2168-0485; 2168-0485
• DOI: 10.1021/acssuschemeng.8b05332

NH3 synthesis almost relies on the energy-intensive Haber–Bosch process with abandoned CO2 emission. Electrochemical N2 reduction offers an environmentally friendly process for sustainable artificial N2 fixation at ambient conditions, but stable and efficient catalysts are demanded for the N2 reduction reaction (NRR). In this Letter, we report that boron-doped TiO2 acts as an efficient non-noble-metal NRR catalyst for electrochemical N2 reduction to NH3 at ambient conditions. This catalyst delivers remarkable NRR performance in 0.1 M Na2SO4 with a NH3 yield of 14.4 μg·h–1·mg–1 cat. and a Faradaic efficiency of 3.4% at −0.8 V vs reversible hydrogen electrode. Notably, it is also excellent in electrochemical durability and selectivity for NH3 formation.