New material converts harmful CO2 into nontoxic, clean fuel

Harmful carbon dioxide could soon be used as a clean energy source with the discovery of a new way to produce a fuel called formate. This new material can be used without producing toxic byproducts and potentially help reduce the 36 gigatonnes of carbon produced each year due to burning of fossil fuel.

Scientists from Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences in China developed the new material to help reduce greenhouse gas that mainly contributes to global warming. The research has been published in the journal Nature.

Formate is just four atoms thick, composed of ultra-thin layers of pure cobalt metal and a cobalt oxide-cobalt metal mix. It is a clean-burning fuel produced through the process of electro-reduction, which just a small electric current is used to change the molecular structure of CO2.

In initial tests, the material appeared to have stable current densities of almost 10 milliamperes of formate per square centimetre with 40 hours. It has approximately 90 percent formate selectivity at an overpotential of only 0.24 volts.

Overpotential is the amount of energy lost because of the slowness of electrochemical reactions on electrodes. Smaller overpotential means better results.

"This represents a fundamental scientific breakthrough," Karthish Manthiram, a chemical engineer from the California Institute of Technology and was not involved in the research, told Popular Mechanics. "Certainly it will be a years-long process before this is worked into a successful, commercial device. But at this stage of development, by all conceivable metrics, this reaction looks very positive."

The research team is now working on making the material commercially available to allow the public use the energy from the harmful CO2 in the atmosphere and potentially reduce its effect on the climate.