Probing the Surface Species and Structural Evolution of Transition Metal Modified Cobalt Oxide Catalyst during an Electrochemical Methane Oxidation Reaction

Presenter

Shane Kenneth Williams

Campus

UMass Amherst

Sponsor

Zhu Chen, Department of Chemical Engineering, UMass Amherst

Schedule

Session 1, 10:30 AM - 11:15 AM [Schedule by Time][Poster Grid for Time/Location]

Location

Poster Board C29, Poster Showcase Room (163), Row 3 (C21-C30) [Poster Location Map]

Abstract

Methane is a main component of natural gas and a byproduct from most industrial processes that is often flared to convert to carbon dioxide before releasing into the atmosphere.  The emission of methane into the atmosphere could cause a greenhouse effect 30 times greater than that of carbon dioxide1.  This accounts for 1% of global carbon dioxide emissions and an energy loss of 145 billion cubic meters of natural gas per year.2 Electrochemical methane oxidation is an attractive method for simultaneously reducing methane emission and producing high-value products, such as methanol. However, the current progress on the electrochemical methane oxidation process suffers from low reactivity due to its symmetric tetrahedral structure that requires 435 kJ/mol to break the first C-H bond and the need to compete with oxygen evolution reaction3. Herein, cobalt oxide with transition metal modification was used as a catalyst to improve the activity of the methane oxidation and we aim to correlate the catalyst performance with its properties, such as crystal structure. The performance will be tested using continuous flow cell electrochemical reactors. Moreover, structure evolution and surface species on the catalyst can be investigated using in-situ Raman spectroscopy. This work highlights mechanistic information on the electrochemical methane oxidation reaction, which opens up new strategies to develop an efficient electrocatalyst for methane oxidation reaction.

Keywords

Biomass Valorization, Electrochemistry, Electrocatalysis

Research Area

Chemistry and Materials Science

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