Electrochemical reduction of NOx species at the interface of nanostructured Pd and PdCu catalysts in alkaline conditions

J. Soto-Hernández, C. R. Santiago-Ramirez, E. Ramirez-Meneses, M. Luna-Trujillo, Jin An Wang, L. Lartundo-Rojas, A. Manzo-Robledo

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59 Scopus citations

Abstract

Electrochemical reduction of NOx species such as nitrates (NO3−), nitrites (NO2−), nitric oxide (NO), nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and their mixtures, was studied at the interface of palladium (Pd) and palladium-copper (PdCu) nanoparticles supported on carbon Vulcan (C). The electro-catalysts were synthesized by impregnation route with a low noble metal content of 5% wt. Pd and 2.5% wt. Pd for the mono and bi-metallic electrocatalyst, respectively. It was found by XRD analysis the formation of a solid solution in the bi-metallic catalyst and the TEM analysis suggest that the incorporation of copper decreases the particle size from 12 to 3 nm in comparison with its counterpart free of copper. Also, XPS technique verify the presence of Pd and Cu species in their metallic-oxidation states. Linear sweep and cyclic voltammetry techniques were used for the evaluation of the electrochemical NOx reduction, using alkaline solutions of NO2 or NO3 saturated with NO2 (synthesized in-situ) and NO (from commercial source). The results showed that the catalytic-activity at the current versus potential (i-E) characteristics improves significantly due to the presence of copper (as also demonstrated by CO-stripping-electrochemical active surface area calculations), inhibiting the process associated with the hydrogen evolution reaction. It is also noted in this work that the reduction faradic-current is c.a. 6 times higher at saturated solutions with NO and NO2. The NOx species were reduced mainly to nitrogen, ammonia and hydrazine as confirmed using on-line differential electrochemical mass spectrometry (DEMS) during steady-state experiments.

Original languageEnglish
Article number118048
JournalApplied Catalysis B: Environmental
Volume259
DOIs
StatePublished - 15 Dec 2019

Keywords

  • DEMS
  • Electro-catalysis
  • NO reduction-interfacial-process
  • Nanoparticles
  • Pollution control

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