Coadsorption of NRR and HER Intermediates Determines the Performance of Ru-N4 toward Electrocatalytic N2 Reduction
Efficiency of the electrochemical N2 reduction reaction (NRR) to ammonia is seriously limited by the competing hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) but our current atomic-scale insight on the factors controlling HER/NRR competition are unknown. Herein we unveil the elementary mechanism, thermodynamics, and kinetics determining the HER/NRR selectivity on the state-of-the-art NRR electrocatalyst, Ru-N4 using constant potential density functional theory calculations (DFT). The calculations show that NRR and HER intermediates coadsorb on the catalyst where HER is greatly suppressed by the NRR intermediates. The first reaction step leading to either *NNH or *H determines the selectivity towards NRR…
Constant inner potential DFT for modelling electrochemical systems under constant potential and bias
Electrochemical interfaces and reactions play a decisive role in e.g. clean energy conversion but understanding their complex chemistry remains an outstanding challenge. Constant potential or grand canonical ensemble (GCE) simulations are indispensable for unraveling the properties of electrochemical processes as a function of the electrode potential. Currently, constant electrode potential calculations at the density functional theory (DFT) level are carried out by fixing the Fermi level of the simulation cell. However, the Fermi level from DFT calculations does does not always reflect the experimentally controlled electrode potential or describe the thermodynamic independent variable in G…