Recent Progress on Boron-Doped Diamond Electrodes for Electrochemical CO2 Reduction: A Mini-review

Abstract

In recent years, boron-doped diamond (BDD) electrodes have attained great significance and emerged as outstanding potential candidates for electrochemical carbon dioxide (CO2) conversion to valuable products. The features like chemical stability, abundant economical raw material, and long cyclic stability of BDD electrodes made them highly competitive as compared to the conventional metal-based electrodes. However, the direction of research approach is not focused and not adequate for improvement in the design, yield, and selectivity. Most of the countries have targeted the achievement of “net zero”, i.e., utmost removal of CO2 from the atmosphere that has been emitted by human activities within the next decade. In this context, we have reviewed electrochemical CO2 reduction using a diamond electrode. In this mini-review, we used the curated literature available in the CAS content collection to present a systematic analysis of the various approaches applied by scientists on recent developments on BDD electrodes for electrochemical reduction of CO2. More significantly, we wisely addressed the challenges and future perspectives to improve the yield and selectivity of CO2 reduction products as a direction to researchers in this field. Multiple strategies have been discussed allied to tackle the high overpotential and low carbon monoxide yield issues. The review highlights the current status and developments with focus on understanding the reaction mechanisms, impact of dopant concentration on performance, improved electrolyte designs, surface characteristics, choice of electrolytes, and challenges such as low yield and unsatisfactory selectivity of BDD based CO2 electroreduction. Our analysis highlights the latest trends alongside the associated challenges with BDD based CO2 electroreduction and future direction for researchers.