Iodide-derived nanostructured silver promotes selective and efficient carbon dioxide conversion into carbon monoxide

It is of great importance to design and develop highly active and selective electrocatalysts for the CO₂ reduction reaction (CO₂RR). In this communication, we report an iodide-derived nanostructured silver catalyst (ID-Ag) as an excellent CO₂RR catalyst that is able to electrochemically reduce CO₂ to CO with approximately 94.5% selectivity at the potential of -0.7 V in CO₂-saturated 0.5 M KHCO₃. This suggests that the highly electrochemical active surface area and adsorbed I^- anions onto the surfaces of the electrode contribute to the enhanced activity and selectivity of the nanostructured Ag electrocatalyst toward CO₂ reduction.