In this interesting article, scientists are attempting to use the extra carbon that humans are releasing into the air and adding to the climate change phenomenon to create a new renewable energy source.
In a Berkeley Lab, scientists are attempting to use electrochemical reduction of this excess carbon dioxide to produce a new fuel. Peidong Yang, a chemist working on this new technology, discovered, using copper and gold as catalysts, the influence of the electronic and geometric effects of the carbon reduction reaction. Yang thinks that by alloying, they can use binding strength of intermediates on the catalysts to really enhance the carbon reduction reaction and harness the kinetic energy from it.
Using the results from this study, Yang and his team think that this will be true for other catalysts tested and are planning to test more catalysts.
Hopefully, Yang and his team can get this new technology up and running so we can start to harness and actually use the excess carbon we are producing! (Yay for mixing my two majors, bio and ENVS, in this chemistry assignment).
The full paper on this issue is published in Nature Communications and titled "Synergistic geometric and electronic effects for electrochemical reduction of carbon dioxide using gold-copper bimetallic nanoparticles."
Submitted by Charlotte King
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