Corrosion Engineering of Part‐Per‐Million Single Atom Pt1/Ni(OH)2 Electrocatalyst for PET Upcycling at Ampere‐Level Current Density

• DOI: 10.1002/adma.202403234
• Publication Date: 2024-03-20T06:33:33Z
• Authors: Minwei Song; Yufeng Wu; Ziyi Zhao; Mengting Zheng; Changlong Wang; Jun Lu
• Keywords: Ampere

Abstract The plastic waste issue has posed a series of formidable challenges for the ecological environment and human health. While conventional recycling strategies often lead to down‐cycling, electrochemical strategy recovering valuable monomers enables an ideal, circular economy. Here corrosion synthesized single atom Pt 1 /Ni(OH) 2 electrocatalyst with part‐per‐million noble loading highly efficient selective upcycling polyethylene terephthalate (PET) into chemicals (potassium diformate terephthalic acid) green hydrogen is reported. Electro‐oxidation PET hydrolysate, ethylene glycol (EG), formate processed high Faraday efficiency (FE) selectivity (>90%) at current density close 1000 mA cm −2 (1.444 V vs RHE). in situ spectroscopy functional theory calculations provide insights mechanism understanding efficiency. Remarkably, electro‐oxidation EG ampere‐level also successfully illustrated by using membrane‐electrode assembly FEs integrated production 500 h continuous operation. This process allows chemical space‐time yield profitable (588–700 $ ton −1 PET), showing industrial perspective on single‐atom catalysis upcycling.